


Home is Where Your Friends Are

by Cait_Sidhe



Series: Sora's Found Family [2]
Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Awesome Kairi (Kingdom Hearts), Awkward Conversations, Battle, Best Friends, Birds, Bisexual Male Character, Bisexuality, Cameras, Canon-Typical Violence, Childhood Friends, Christmas Town (Nightmare Before Christmas), Coming Out, Cooking, Crossdressing, Depressed Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Depression, Developing Relationship, Drinking, Eventual Kairi/Riku/Sora, F/M, Family, Feelings, Feelings Realization, Festivals, First Kiss, Flirting, Fluff, Flying, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Gardens & Gardening, Getting Together, Gummi Ships (Kingdom Hearts), Halloween Town (Nightmare Before Christmas), Heart-to-Heart, Heartless (Kingdom Hearts) - Freeform, Heartless Attacks (Kingdom Hearts), Hollow Bastion | Radiant Garden, Hollow Bastion | Radiant Garden Restoration Committee, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Jealousy, Kairi & Riku & Sora Friendship (Kingdom Hearts), Keyblade Wielder Kairi (Kingdom Hearts), Keyblade Wielders (Kingdom Hearts), Keyblades (Kingdom Hearts), Lion cubs, Lions, M/M, Magic, Missing Persons, Multi, Olympus Coliseum (Kingdom Hearts), POV Mickey, POV Riku (Kingdom Hearts), Photography, Play Fighting, Polyamory, Pre-Kairi/Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Pre-Relationship, Pride Lands (The Lion King), Protective Riku (Kingdom Hearts), Realizing Sexual Orientation, Running Away, Self-Esteem Issues, Sexual Orientation, Smoking, Squirrels, Tea Parties, Team as Family, Teasing, Tournaments, Traveling, Underage Drinking, Underage Drug Use, Underage Smoking, Wonderland, magic house
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:02:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 55,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25042861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cait_Sidhe/pseuds/Cait_Sidhe
Summary: Upon finally returning to the Destiny Islands, Riku, Sora, and Kairi realize that the place simply isn't the same as nostalgia expected it to be. When Sora gets kicked out of his home on top of that, the trio decides to leave, setting up home base at Merlin's house in Radiant Garden.There, they help the Restoration Committee, Kairi learns to use her keyblade, Merlin teaches them magic in his own strange way, Sora struggles with depression, and the three start to realize that maybe their feelings for each other go beyond friendship...And of course, the three finally get to travel to other worlds together! Worlds featured here are Halloween/Christmas Town, Wonderland, Olympus Coliseum, and Pride Lands.
Relationships: Kairi & Riku & Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Kairi & Riku (Kingdom Hearts), Kairi/Riku (Kingdom Hearts), Kairi/Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Kairi/Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Riku & Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Series: Sora's Found Family [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1813543
Comments: 26
Kudos: 113





	1. New Home

**Author's Note:**

> I just wanted these kids to finally get to travel together. Note that at the start, none of the three have fully realized their feelings yet, or even their orientations (although they're pretty obvious to everyone but them).
> 
> This is in Riku's POV. Whereas this is eventually SoRiKai, I'm so used to writing SoRiku that the bias may have slipped in, but I tried to make it evident that he starts having feelings for both. The relationship here is more about finding out feelings, and ends with them getting together, rather than being together the whole time.
> 
> This also focuses a lot on Sora being depressed and his friends worrying about him. 
> 
> The T rating and drug/alcohol related tags are for (mostly accidental on the characters' parts) things that happen in Wonderland.

“I’m so excited!” Kairi sang, spinning around with her arms out.

“How are you so hyper?” Sora groaned, slumped in the co-pilot seat of the GummiShip. 

Riku glanced at his friend before returning his eyes back to the strange space-like area called the Lanes Between. “Probably because, other circumstances aside, this is the first time we actually get to go on an adventure together,” he suggested.

“Yes, exactly! I’m just so happy I finally get to travel with you two!” Kairi beamed. “And I’m going to get to see my home world! I wonder if anyone there will know me? Do you think I still have family there? I vaguely remember a grandmother. Did I have parents too? Will they be there?”

Riku chuckled at the display. “Okay, we get it, Kairi. Now sit down before you off-balance the ship.” Despite the attempt at an authoritative instruction, Riku couldn’t hide his amusement. Kairi’s excitement could be contagious! Almost as much as Sora’s, even if it wasn’t as frequent… Speaking of Sora…

“Are you sure I can’t drive?” Sora asked, noticing Riku looking at him.

“Why do you want to drive so badly?” Riku questioned. To Sora’s annoyance, Riku had insisted on driving, and Sora had been complaining frequently about that. Sora claimed the times he’d crashed the ship were all Donald’s fault for distracting him, so Riku shouldn’t worry, but that only made Riku more insistent that Sora not be in the pilot seat—right now, Sora had more than enough reason to be distracted, due to the main reason for what the three were currently doing.

“Because sitting here is so bo-ring!” Sora dragged out the last word into a whine.

Kairi giggled. “Come on, Sora, cheer up! We finally all get to travel together!”

Sora mumbled something indistinct.

Kairi sighed, draping her arms across the back of Sora’s chair; she’d been aiming for his shoulders but Sora had slumped so far down she couldn’t quite reach, so she ruffled his hair instead. “Look, I know the reason we’re doing so right now kinda sucks, but honestly? We wouldn’t have lasted there much longer, anyway. None of us felt the same way about the Islands as we did before. One of us would have gotten fed up with it eventually; it’s probably better that we left so soon, before anyone could get used to us being back.”

Riku smiled slightly. Kairi was usually the voice of reason between the three of them, and Sora generally listened to her logic. Mostly because she was much better at communicating things, whereas both Riku and Sora were horrible at such. She had a way of saying things in simpler terms that were easier to understand yet still got the point across; Sora tended to just blurt things out in a jumbled knot of words you had to decipher, and Riku was just bad with phrasing things and over thought a lot. If he had time to think beforehand he could be quite eloquent, but when put on the spot he usually just froze up and ended up saying the wrong things. They both also had much less patience than Kairi, which was not conducive to efficiently explaining things.

“Yeah, I guess that’s true,” Sora conceded, sitting back up.

“Right! So stop moping! We’re going on an adventure, after all. The three of us. Finally!” Kairi leapt back and flopped into her seat.

Sora laughed, and it sounded genuine for the first time in—wait, had it really only been less than 24 hours? It felt like much longer. “Yeah, about time!” Sora said. “We’ve only been slipping past each other for a couple years now. Or outright hiding.” Sora glared at Riku, though a small smile indicated it was playful. “Stalker.”

Riku cringed slightly, blushing in embarrassment. They weren’t going to let him live that down, were they? “Yeah, yeah,” he said casually. The subject was still slightly raw, but teasing and joking was how the three of them usually dealt with difficult things, so it was okay. When it came to each other, they instinctively knew where the line was between that and taking-it-too-far, as well as what was taboo to joke about.

One of those taboos was the reason that the three of them had fled the Destiny Islands only a week after returning there. Sora vehemently avoided speaking of the subject despite his mood indicating that he was immensely affected by such—and he would be for a while, Riku had no doubt. It was not one of those things that simply went away, rather stuck with you for life: Sora’s mother had kicked him out of the house. Permanently.

After Riku and Sora returned to the Islands via crashing into the sea, things had happened in a whirlwind. Parents cried, there were too many hugs (at least in Riku’s opinion), doctors were seen, the schools were contacted, and all those other things that happen when teenagers go missing for two years and then are found. Kairi thankfully hadn’t experienced all this, despite being gone a month—in fact, she actually now was considered a hero in town, valiantly setting out to find her two missing friends and succeeding. Unfortunately, not everything that happened was good. Namely, the rumors. Because of “World Order”, they had to make up a story to tell everyone, and had settled on a simple “Riku ran away, Sora followed”. Kairi’s original disappearance wasn’t mentioned, as everyone’s memories of that year were fuzzy (because the Destiny Islands had fallen, but the townspeople didn’t know that) so no one actually had noticed. 

What they didn’t anticipate was that people would start speculating about the reason they ran away, causing rumors to abound. Claiming it was merely wanderlust and teenage angst did not placate a surprising amount of people, and gossip around town quickly decided that there must be more to it, with a fair amount concluding that mere friends would not simply run off together, even if best friends, and especially not if two boys, unless they were more than such.

Sora’s mom had confronted Sora about these rumors. Sora—who hadn’t really thought anything about his sexuality the past few years due to saving the universe, being asleep for a year, and then saving the universe again—didn’t say anything to refute them, as he was highly confused as to why his mom was even talking about this in the first place. By the time his mind caught up with the conversation, his mom was on a rant about how that kind of thing was wrong, which made Sora mad (he knew some very nice gay people, after all); not thinking things through, and confused as to why his mom would even care, Sora had shouted “why should it matter if I’m gay,” which Sora’s mom took as a confession and threw him out of the house, telling him not to return, to Sora’s complete shock.

After discussing things with Riku, the two decided that they’d had enough of the Destiny Islands regardless—the place simply was not the same as they’d remembered. Honestly, they shouldn’t have assumed the Islands would be the same in the first place. Plus, after two years of travelling between many more interesting worlds, it had been rather anticlimactic to return only to realize that their tiny world was downright boring and, honestly, fairly claustrophobic too—Sora and Riku simply weren’t used to being confined. After their taste of freedom and adventure, staying at home under the watch of now-overprotective parents and teachers on a small little island only caused anxiety and other negative feelings. Sora, now homeless, was certainly not going to stay, and wherever Sora went Riku followed. He hadn’t protected Sora for more than a year just to have him wander off again, after all. And of course, they had invited Kairi along, who was only too willing to travel with her two best friends to other worlds, like they’d been dreaming of doing since they were young kids. She probably would have followed them anyway, especially since they’d decided upon going to Radiant Garden, which is where she’d been born.

So, the very next day, the three had set off in a Gummi Ship that had been left on the Islands by Mickey for them to use “only in case of emergency”. The three had decided that this was enough of an emergency. Riku had left a fairly honest note to his parents that said he, Sora, and Kairi couldn’t stand being on the Islands anymore (which actually was the truth, although only part of the reason) but that they shouldn’t worry. He considered saying he would write them regularly, but decided against it, as truthfully he’d probably forget to. As to Kairi’s parents…

“Hey, Kairi, how’d you convince your parents to let you come with us?” Riku asked, realizing he didn’t actually know.

“Oh! I just told them that you two had found my home world, and that I really really really wanted to see it!” The girl said cheerfully. “They were actually pretty excited about it; they know how I’ve been dying to learn about my past. I told them I’d take pictures and send them letters.” Kairi pulled a polaroid camera out of her bag, and before Riku and Sora could react she’d snapped a photo.

“Kairi!” Riku chided. “You know you can’t send them photos of the ship!”

“And why not?” Kairi asked innocently as she shook the developing photo.

“Well, there’s this little thing called ‘World Order’. Yen Sid is fairly strict about maintaining that, and seems like someone who gets pretty scary when he’s angry.”

“Because he is,” Sora jumped in. “Trust me, you do not want to cross him,” Sora said with a shiver.

“Pfft. He didn’t tell me that, just you!” Kairi argued jovially. “Besides, my parents already know about the other worlds, so it’s no big deal.” She set the photo carefully on the Gummiship’s dashboard so it could develop properly.

Riku and Sora just looked at Kairi in confusion. “They do?” the latter asked.

“Mhm,” Kairi hummed. “Look, I fell from the sky during a meteor shower. Did you really think no one would come to explain it to them, and tell them to keep quiet?”

“Oh, wow, I never thought about that,” Sora said in amazement.

“Do you know who it was?” Riku asked.

Kairi shook her head. “Sorry. I was still unconscious when they visited.”

“But they didn’t know where you were from?” Sora asked.

“No, unfortunately not. Everyone forgot the name, remember?”

“Right…”

At that point, Riku noticed the aforementioned world of Radiant Garden was in their sights, rapidly growing closer.

“Buckle in; we’re here,” Riku said.

“Woohoo!” Kairi yelled, arms in the air. “So-ra, Ri-ku, yell with me!”

“Woo…” Sora said half-heartedly, as Riku simply groaned.

Kairi pouted. “Hmph. You two are no fun.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“...And now, we’re here,” Riku finished explaining (leaving certain specifics out, like why Sora had been kicked out) to Leon, Yuffie, and Aerith. The others that usually were around were off doing other things. Riku, Kairi, and Sora had come straight to Merlin’s (and the others’? They were always here. But if so where did they sleep? The house was tiny) upon landing. Merlin was out, but Leon and the two girls were home.

“That’s… quite the complicated situation,” Leon said, looking over at Sora, who had told Riku to explain things and then immediately flopped face-down upon the green-with-white-polka-dots couch. “Is he asleep?”

Riku strolled over to the couch and poked Sora between the shoulders.

“Oww! Ri-kuuuu!” Sora complained into the couch cushion, answering the question.

Yuffie, Aerith, and Kairi chuckled while Leon stifled a laugh.

“Well, you three are welcome to stay here as long as you’d like,” Aerith decided. “Our home is your home.”

“Technically it’s Merlin’s,” Leon pointed out. “But I’m sure he won’t mind. We can ask him to magic up more rooms.”

“So you all do live here?” Riku asked, looking around the small space.

“Mhmm.” Aerith answered with a hum. “It looks like a tiny one-story thing from the outside, but it’s much bigger inside. There’s about two dozen rooms up those stairs.” She pointed to the corner.

“One of them even leads to a forest!” Yuffie chimed.

“Oooh, there’s a forest in the house? I want to see!” Kairi said, apparently unphased, unlike Riku. A forest? In a house? What?

“Sure! There’s some fun plants in there, too!”

“Yuffie,” Leon said sternly.

“Yessss, Leon?”

“If you let them anywhere near those plants…”

“Pfft. You’re no fun.”

“Oh!” Kairi said. “Before I forget, there are moogles around here, right? Sora told me they can send letters to other worlds. I need to let my parents know that we made it here okay.”

“I can show you,” Aerith said, smiling gently at her. “Riku, Sora, do you want to come too?”

“Meh. We’ve seen moogles before,” Sora answered for them both, waving his arm indifferently. He’d twisted on the couch to lay on his side.

As Aerith and Kairi left, Cid entered, holding a wrench and covered in grease. “Who’s the young lass with Aerith?” He asked.

“Kairi,” Leon supplied. “She’s Sora and Riku’s friend.” 

“Oh! Didn’ see you two over there,” Cid said, noticing Riku, now sitting on the arm of the couch, and Sora, who still was laying on it languidly. “What’s with him?” he gestured to Sora, who glanced at Cid but didn’t move.

“He’s not feeling very well,” Riku explained as he walked over and offered his hand. “I don’t think we’ve met before. I’m Riku.”

“Hmm. Well, nice ta meet ya, Riku, but seein’ as my hands are full of grease from GummiShip maintenance, I ain’t gonna shake yer hand.” Cid looked towards Sora again. “Looks like he could use some of those plants Merlin’s got.”

“Cid.” Leon used the same voice he had when Yuffie had mentioned the plants.

“Yeah, yeah.” Cid waved a hand in dismissal. “I’m gonna get cleaned up, call me when dinner’s ready.” He headed up the stairs.

Leon stared after him. “Wait. Isn’t it his turn to cook…?”

Yuffie narrowed her eyes. “Yes. Yes it is. I bet he’s trying to get out of it again. I’ll go ‘remind’ him.” She dashed up the steps after Cid.

Leon sighed, then headed over to the couch, sitting on the edge next to Sora—now face-down again—and putting a hand on his back. “Hey. Talk to me, kid.”

Sora mumbled something into the cushion that sounded like “don’t wanna.”

“Sora…” Riku said, sitting on the arm of the couch and looking at his friend. From what he understood, the people here had helped Sora out on countless occasions—from how Sora talked about them, and their interactions so far, they seemed almost like a family, Sora included. Leon seemed to be treating Sora almost like a son, actually. Riku wondered if that’s how Sora saw the man; Sora hadn’t known his father, so Riku couldn’t help to hope that Leon had managed to fill that roll in Sora’s life.

“Well, then, do you want to help me make dinner for everyone?” Leon suggested.

Sora turned to peek up at Leon. “I thought Cid was supposed to make it?”

“Yeah, but he’s just gonna complain so much we won’t get dinner until midnight.”

Sora shrugged one shoulder the best he could. “That’s fine. I’m not really hungry anyway.”

Leon raised his eyebrows. “You’re not… but you’re always hungry.” He looked towards Riku, who just shrugged and shook his head slightly, equally surprised. Sora not hungry?

“Hey,” Riku said, pulling on Sora’s arm. “C’mon, I’ll help cook, too.”

Sora sighed. “Fine,” he said, getting up and allowing Riku to lead him to the kitchen after Leon, Riku with his hand still on Sora’s arm. Riku knew Sora could get there on his own, but for some reason he felt letting go of Sora would cause the brunette to collapse. Sora didn’t say a word about it, so Riku figured it was fine.

The kitchen was on the second floor, and humongous. Well, maybe kitchen wasn’t the right word. It seemed to be a combination of a kitchen and magical potion laboratory. It was mostly stone—floor, ceiling, and (four? Six? It kept fluctuating?) walls, and even tables. One side had what appeared to be a kiln, a strange stove-like thing making spurting noises and had green fog hovering around it (Riku made a note not to go near that thing), and a fire with a simmering cauldron over it emitting thin blue trails of smoke into a fume hood. The tables had all sorts of strange apparatuses and bottles of liquids along them.

“Um. This is the kitchen?” Riku asked.

“Well, that’s all Merlin’s… whatever that is,” Leon said, gesturing to most the room. “Kitchen’s in the corner there.” He gestured behind Riku, where in a corner stood a modern stove, oven, microwave, and a laminate counter full of various pots, pans, and cooking utensils. The section of floor under it was covered in pink linoleum.

“Ah, I see. Er, where do you eat, then?” There was no sign of any table here that wasn’t covered in possibly-toxic things, and downstairs only had a low coffee table and a couple side tables. Was there a dining room upstairs? This house(?) was already confusing, and Riku had only seen two floors of it!

“Oh, usually we just eat wherever, since we’re always going in and out and stuff, but whenever we do decide to all eat together Merlin conjures a table downstairs.” Leon shrugged. “When he gets back from wherever he is, I’ll ask him to do that—with you three here, I’m sure everyone will want to eat together.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Sora, wake up,” Riku said, tapping the brunette’s shoulder. Once they’d finished cooking, Sora had collapsed onto the (now blue-and-yellow-striped; when had it changed?) couch, this time actually falling asleep.

“Don’t wanna,” Sora muttered, sleepily slapping Riku's hand away.

Riku chuckled as Kairi hopped over; she’d returned with Aerith just after Sora had fallen asleep. “But everyone’s here now, to eat dinner with us. The one you helped make,” she said. The food had been kept warm with magic, and the coffee table had been transformed into a huge round table with enough chairs for everyone: Sora, Riku, Kairi, Leon, Cid, Yuffie, Aerith, Tifa, Cloud, and Merlin.

Sora sat up, blinking sleepily, then noticed everyone standing around. “Oh!” Sora jumped up, huge smile plastered on his face (fake, but it appeared only Riku and possibly Kairi realized that). “Everyone IS here! Tifa, Cloud, Merlin, you weren’t here before! It’s been a while!” He hopped over to each in turn, giving them huge hugs. Tifa returned it with a small surprised smile, Cloud patted Sora on the head awkwardly, and Merlin simply looked confused. Apparently, Sora had never hugged any of the three before, judging from their reactions.

Leon chuckled. “Glad to see you’re feeling better, kid.”

Sora smiled wider. “Yup! Guess all I needed was a nap!”

Because the magic of the house provided every ingredient desired, Leon suggested creating an island-style feast so everyone could see what their home food was like. Riku wasn’t entirely sure how Sora would feel about that, as it’d remind Sora about the islands, which they’d fled from on a bad note (how ironic, after they’d been itching to return for years), but it seemed to have actually cheered Sora up a little to have such familiar food. So the spread included such dishes as pineapple-marinated pork, coconut-crusted fish, mashed breadfruit with coconut milk, poisson cru, steamed crab, a taro and yam hash, grilled plantains, baked papaya, and various other dishes.

Everyone at the table was highly impressed. “When did you two learn to cook?” Kairi joked.

Sora laughed at that. “Have you seen Donald and Goofy’s cooking? Me learning how to cook for myself was a vital life skill on our journey!”

“Well, it’s certainly nice to have such a feast, especially with everyone together,” Tifa said. “Thank you.”

Everyone else went around saying how grateful they were, as well, making both Riku and Sora blush. Sora seemed genuinely happy now.

They ate in comfortable silence for a while, and then Cid spoke up. “So, how long do you plan to stay here?” he asked.

“You can stay as long as you want,” Aerith told them.

“Yeah!” Yuffie shouted. “You can stay forever! I’d love to have some sparring partners that actually prove a challenge!”

“Hey!” Could and Leon said at the same time, garnering laughs around the table.

“Do you have plans for what you’ll do now?” Tifa asked.

Riku answered. “Well, Kairi wants to look into her heritage—she recently learned this is her homeworld. And Sora and I figured we could help with the restoration for a while.”

“We also want to travel!” Kairi added. “All of us together. We haven’t had a chance to yet, even though that’s why we initially wanted to leave our world, until these two messed things up.” She glared teasingly at Riku and Sora.

“Hey! I had nothing to do with that!” Sora protested, and Riku chuckled.

“Well, then,” Merlin said jovially. “Looks like this will be your home now, too! I’ll prepare individual rooms upstairs for each of you. Or would you prefer to share?” he had a sparkle in his eyes as he said that… oh. Well then.

Kairi and Riku both declined the offer of sharing a room as Sora, ever oblivious, said “Sure!” Riku and Kairi put their hands on their foreheads and sighed while everyone else but Sora laughed—Sora simply appeared to be extremely confused.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku awoke the next morning with Sora in his bed anyway. He slowly removed Sora’s arm from his chest, doing his best not to disturb the boy, but that didn’t pan out.

“R’ku?” Sora muttered sleepily.

“Hey there, sleepyhead,” Riku said with a chuckle.

“Why are you in my bed?”

Riku raised an eyebrow. “Um. Pretty sure you’re the one in my bed.”

Sora sat up, looking around. “Oh. Yeah, my room was purple or something.” Each room had the walls a random vibrant color—Kairi’s was a hot pink that quite frankly hurt the eyes, Sora’s was a light violet, and Riku’s was sky blue.

“Well, now that we’re both up, want to get breakfast?” Riku glanced at his alarm on the small side table. “It’s… oh wow, it’s ten o’clock already.” Riku was quite surprised—he usually was a morning person, unlike Sora.

“Mmm, sounds good, yeah.” Sora muttered, voice still heavy with sleep as he rubbed at his eyes. Riku had to admit, Sora looked rather cute in the pajamas Tifa had lent him, although Sora had been slightly embarrassed about them (she and Yuffie were the only ones small enough to have clothing that fit Sora, and according to Sora the pajamas Yuffie had offered were “the kind that aren’t meant to stay on very long”, whatever that meant). The pants were pink with a chocobo print, and the oversized wide-collared shirt, hanging off the shoulder at one side, was pastel yellow with a big moogle picture. Riku, on the other hand, wore simple blue pajama pants with a darker blue t-shirt. He and Kairi had been able to pack before leaving, but Sora’s mom wouldn’t let him anywhere near the house, even to get his things. He'd been able to sneak in to get the magical items from his journey, but before he could do any real packing his mom came home earlier than expected and threatened to call the cops.

Sora frowned. “Riku, your face is red. Are you okay?”

Riku blinked. Was he actually blushing? Huh. That was new. Or maybe not. Aw, crap. “Nah, I’m fine,” Riku said quickly, jumping out of the bed. “C’mon, I’m hungry.” He grabbed Sora’s wrist and led him downstairs to the kitchen.

To both of their delight, the fridge provided them with coconut milk for their cereal. That’s what the islands usually used, so they were more used to that taste than the various other types of milks the different worlds had. The kitchen provided them with any cereal they wanted, too, so Riku had a simple raisin bran and Sora chose the most sugary monstrosity he could think of.

“You really should eat healthier foods,” Riku pointed out, as they sat down on the couch on the ground floor (it had changed colors again, this time to carrot-orange with green trim). The large round table had returned to being the smaller rectangular coffee table. 

Sora pouted. “But those don’t taste good!”

“Sure they do, once you get used to them.”

“Hey, do you think Kairi is up yet?” Sora asked, in a clear attempt to change the subject.

Riku shrugged. “No clue.” Unlike Riku and Sora, who had been having sleepovers until shortly before the islands fell, Kairi had been stopped from having sleepovers with them around the age of ten. But she had always been awake when Sora and Riku stormed her house as soon as they both woke, so presumably she didn’t sleep in as late as Sora liked to.

Well, speak of the Kairi, and she shall appear. Kairi walked in the front door followed by Aerith, both with baskets in their arms. Kairi wore a pretty knee-length sleeveless lilac dress Riku hadn’t seen before, probably borrowed from one of the girls there as it wasn’t a style you’d typically find on the Islands. Its skirt looked like it could flare out to be completely flat if Kairi spun fast enough, and Riku was pretty sure her parents would not have approved of the collar’s cut—not that Riku was complaining.

“Oh! You’re awake!” The redhead cheered.

“Yeah, thanks to Riku,” Sora mumbed with playful ruefulness. “Nice dress, Kairi,” he commented.

Riku looked at Sora in false shock. “Excuse me? You’re the one who was in—you know what, fine, I woke you. But you’d sleep past noon if we all let you!”

Kairi giggled, then gestured to her basket. “I see you’re already almost done eating, but we brought some fresh fruit from the farmer’s market!”

“I know Merlin’s fridge gives you what you want,” Aerith said, “but nothing beats fresh fruit straight from the farm!”

“There’s peaches, apples, star fruit, and some things I’ve never heard of like apricorns, kirima, amango, and cactus fruit,” Kairi said happily.

“Ooh! I want to try some!” Sora said eagerly, jumping up.

“Hey, watch it!” Riku said, catching Sora’s (thankfully empty) cereal bowl before it crashed to the ground. The spoon wasn’t so lucky.

“Oops. Sorry, Riku,” Sora apologized briefly before dashing over to the fruit baskets Kairi and Aerith had placed on a small table near the door that Merlin’s house must have decided to materialize for them.

“What’s with all the commotion?” Leon asked as he emerged from the stairway.

“Leon!” Sora bounced over to him, fruit in hand. “Have you tried kirima? It’s the best fruit ever!” He waved his already half-eaten fruit around, then pointed it towards the girls, still next to the baskets. “They brought a whole bunch of them!”

Leon chuckled. “Hmm, I see. Well, pretty sure everyone else has already headed out to work, so why don’t you two get proper clothes on and I’ll show you the current projects everyone is working on?”

“Okay, sounds good!” 

Riku held out his hand. “Hold up, Sora. The only clothes you have with you are the magical clothing the fairies gave you, right?”

“Well, yeah. But that’s okay! They magically stay clean.”

“I know, but are those okay to do work in? They’re covered in belts and zippers and stuff, for some reason no one but the fairies know...”

Leon cringed. “Yeah, those are probably a bit dangerous to do construction work in, Sora. I’d recommend jeans and a simple shirt without a billion things that can get caught on stuff.”

Sora pouted. “They haven’t gotten caught on anything yet!”

Kairi raised an eyebrow. “Really? So what was that coconut tree you got stuck in only a few days ago?”

Sora bit his lip. “Okay, I see your point. But that was an outcrier!”

“‘Outlier’,” Riku corrected. “Either way, you’re not doing construction work in those clothes,” he said firmly.

“Then what should I wear? These pajamas?”

Yuffie jumped in to answer that; she had snuck in without them noticing, true to her ninja nature. “I can lend you something!”

“Yuffie, all you have are crop-tops and mini-shorts,” Leon pointed out.

“So? Sora would look cute in them!”

Sora, judging by his horrified expression, did not think so. Kairi and Riku snickered. Riku briefly wondered if Sora would look good in them. Kairi surely would; she liked short shorts and skirts. Yeah, she’d definitely look cool in the more rugged style Yuffie wore.

“Well, what do you say, Sora?” Yuffie asked happily. Riku wasn’t sure if she’d noticed Sora’s expression of horror or not. He figured she probably did notice and was teasing as a result; she seemed like the type of person who would.

“Nooooo!” Sora said. “I’d rather wear Kairi’s school uniform!”

Kairi giggled. “Well, you do fit it perfectly.”

“Kairi!”

“And it does look pretty cute on you,” Riku added.

“Riku!”

“Oh?” Yuffie said, curiosity lacing her voice. “Sora, have you perhaps tried it on before?”

Sora’s face grew bright red. “It was a dare! And I was eight!”

“The first time,” Kairi said, grinning. “Not the second time.”

“There was a second time?” Sora asked. “When?”

“Literally five days ago, and it was a bet—that you set up,” Riku reminded Sora. Kairi had just picked up her new school uniform and had been complaining how it didn’t fit right, and somehow that led to Sora betting Riku that it’d fit him better.

“Oh yeah—you still owe me munny on that!” Sora remembered. “I totally rocked that skirt and you know it!”

“Okay, enough of that,” Leon said. “Sora, you can wear the magical clothing today—we’ll do a tour of the current restoration projects, and then take you shopping for new clothes. Does that sound good?”

Sora frowned. “I still don’t think I need—”

“Sounds good,” Riku answered for Sora.

“Aerith and I are going to walk around to see if I can remember anything,” Kairi said.

“And pick flowers! I can’t sell flowers if I don’t have any to sell!” Aerith said happily.

Kairi giggled. “Yes, and pick flowers!”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Sora, pay attention,” Riku hissed quietly, kicking Sora subtly in the shin.

“Ow! I am!” Sora whispered back, even though he’d clearly been lost in his own thoughts.

Riku rolled his eyes and returned his attention to Leon, who was describing how they planned to spruce up the wall along the bailey. It had been a week since the trio had arrived in Radiant Garden, and so far they’d gotten a fair amount done; their various keyblade abilities had helped quite a bit to make things go faster. The previous day they’d finished working on a fountain, and today they planned to start the wall. Kairi was again with Aerith, who was helping her do research in hopes of learning more about her lost family.

Suddenly, Riku noticed that Sora had wandered off a little. Leon noticed, too, and called attention to it, asking why Sora was staring absently at a random section of the wall.

“There’s a weird crack in this wall,” Sora said.

“There’s cracks all over the wall,” Leon said, with more patience than Riku would ever have. “That’s something we’re going to fix, as I was just explaining.”

“Yeah, but this one’s different,” Sora said, kicking at the crack a little.

Riku sighed, strolling over to Sora and leading him by the shoulder, back to where they, Leon, and Yuffie had been talking.

After the explaining had finished, they headed to their next location, walking past the section of the wall Sora had been examining.

The wall burst open, a group of about a dozen heartless pouring out.

“See? I told you there was something fishy about it!” Sora yelled accusingly, as he and Riku drew their keyblades and began slashing at the creatures Leon and Yuffie pulled out their weapons to fight as well.

They were either extremely weak heartless or Sora and Riku had grown stronger than they’d realized. Riku decided it must be the former, but Sora decided the latter.

“Don’t get a big head now, Sora,” Leon warned. “Those may have been easy, but there’s no guarantee that’s all of them.”

As if on cue, Kairi and Aerith appeared, dashing towards the group with a couple Large Bodies following them.

“Sora! Riku!” Kairi called, holding her keyblade out.

“Whoa, careful, Kairi!” Sora yelled. The redhead had nearly accidentally stabbed Sora as she ran up to them. “We need to teach you proper keyblade safety.”

“Like you’re any better,” Riku quipped.

Kairi ignored the two, catching her breath before saying, “I took out the smaller ones, but how the hell do you beat those things?”

“Attack them from behind,” Riku supplied. “They take a bit of time to turn around, so wait until they charge, dodge it, and strike.”

“Or just hit them really hard with magic!” Sora practically cheered, readying a spell.

Riku turned to Sora. The tip of his keyblade was glowing a light sepia color, different from any spell Riku recalled Sora knowing. The spell also required charging. Riku got a bad feeling about this. Should he stop it? He should stop it. “Sora—”

“METEOR!” Sora yelled, and a giant, well, meteor materialized above the two heartless, crashing down on them and breaking into bits that flew everywhere, though they dissipated before hitting any of the humans there. The spell defeated the heartless, but also destroyed a good portion of the wall.

There was a beat of silence as the group processed things, then Leon yelled, “What the hell was that?!”

“Uhhh… Merlin taught it to me last night,” Sora replied, voice strange. Riku turned to find Sora sitting on the ground in a daze.

Riku knelt next to Sora, putting his hand on his back. “Hey, you okay?” he asked softly. “Looks like that took a lot out of you.”

“Yeah…” Sora replied. “Er. I guess. That spell is a lot more draining than I thought it’d be…” Riku sighed at that. He should talk to Merlin about teaching Sora only magic that he could actually handle; he wouldn’t put it past the magician to try teaching Sora whatever magic the eager boy wanted to learn, including spells that could kill him.

Once Sora had regained his wits, Leon informed Sora that it was great that the heartless had been defeated, but as he’d destroyed the wall in the process, it was his responsibility to fix. Sora said something about some other spell Merlin taught him that could help, upon which Leon promptly banned him from using any new magic during their construction work.


	2. Halloween/Christmas Town

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Riku, Sora, and Kairi visit Santa.

The days passed by quickly. Riku and Sora’s mornings were dedicated to reconstruction work, while Kairi’s were spent researching her home and helping Aerith with miscellaneous things. In the afternoons, the three teens trained vigorously with their keyblades; Kairi was brand new with hers, after all, so needed to learn before they could go adventuring, especially with heartless still popping up on occasion. Merlin sometimes taught them magic, too, though the schedule for it was sporadic—once he even woke them up well after midnight to learn some sort of moonlight-based spell that none of the three managed to understand at all. 

Two weeks after arriving in Radiant Garden, Riku and Sora decided that Kairi’s keyblade skills were developed enough to go adventuring.

“What’s your favorite world, Sora?” Kairi asked once they were in the GummiShip. They hadn’t yet decided where they’d be going. 

“Me?” Sora asked in surprise. “Ummm… Riku, where do you like best?”

“Kairi asked you first,” Riku responded. Honestly, he had no idea which world he liked best. Unlike Sora, who made friends everywhere, Riku had made a lot of enemies.

“But there’s so many good places!”

Riku tried to think of some of the places Sora had visited that Kairi would like. Maybe Neverland? They could fly there—wait. Bad idea; flying there relied on happiness, and although it’d been a couple weeks since the incident, Riku wasn’t sure how well Sora could maintain that. Maybe Atlantica? Kairi liked mermaids… oh, but that might remind Sora of the Islands. Agrabah and Deep Jungle were cool, but maybe a bit too sweaty. Land of Dragons was also neat, but it also held the painful reminder of when Riku and Sora met there. Wonderland, maybe? That place was very whimsical and fun. 

“Oh, I know!” Sora said. “Let’s go to Halloween Town! It connects to Christmas Town—you can meet Santa! I’m sure you’ll be on the Nice List, Kairi.”

Riku blinked at Sora, processing. What? “Sora, Santa isn—oomph!” Sora had covered Riku’s mouth with his hand.

“Don’t say that! Telling people he isn’t real is why you and I are on the Naughty List!” Sora hissed. 

Riku didn’t comment; if there were a Santa, and Riku were on the Naughty List, it would definitely not be because of that. Riku had done much worse things.

“Well, let’s go find out, then!” Kairi said happily. 

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Whoa, Riku, you look so cool! Kairi, you too!” Sora proclaimed, examining their Halloween Town outfits a little too closely.

Riku blushed; out of the corner of his eye he noticed Kairi was doing so, too. Riku wore a werewolf costume… or was it a costume? Riku experimentally wagged his tail. Yup, that worked. So did the ears. But everything else seemed pretty human-like, except for the claws. From the looks of it, all three of them had claws—maybe that was a feature of this world. Riku’s outfit itself was basically a tattered black shirt and jeans, nothing particularly special about it otherwise.

Riku examined Kairi’s costume next. She was dressed as a witch, in a pink short-sleeve knee-length dress trimmed in black lace. She wore black-and-white striped knee-high socks, one up to her knee and the other scrunched at her ankle, matching her arm-warmers. Her hat matched her outfit, pink with a black bow. The outfit was finished with black boots and a black lace choker adorned with a pink gem. She had on silver eyeshadow and black mascara. It was quite adorable. Kairi, noticing Riku looking, stuck her tongue out teasingly, and Riku blushed.

“You look like one of those magical girls from those cartoons,” Sora commented in awe. “Not that I watched those,” he added quickly with a blush. 

“Speaking of magical girls,” Kairi said, clearly holding back a laugh, “What’s with your outfit?”

Sora frowned. “What do you mean? I’m a vamp—what the hell!?” he proclaimed as he looked down at his outfit. “This is not what I usually look like here! Riku, what did you do?”

Riku put his hands up upon noting Sora’s glare. “Hey, don’t look at me. Kairi cast the spell to keep world-order.” Merlin had taught all three of them the spell beforehand, but Kairi had been the best at it—or rather, most confident. Sora could do it just as well, if not better, but he insisted Kairi would do it best. Riku, on the other hand, had downright failed.

Kairi shrugged. “I dunno how the magic chooses things. Besides, even if I could choose designs, I’ve never seen your usual outfit—if you wanted it, you should have cast the spell yourself.”

Riku looked at Sora’s outfit. Like Kairi, he didn’t bother to hide his examination of it, which caused the brunette to deeply blush. Sora wore a dress in the same style as Kairi’s, except it was black with red lace. He wore red platform shoes with little moving bats where laces normally would be over spiderweb-design fishnet stockings, which matched the arm stockings that were held in place by thumb holes. His head was adorned with a miniature black top-hat decorated with a red bow adorned with a moving bat in the center. It was tilted to the side, probably held in place with hidden clips as there was no way it could stay on naturally. On his back there were tiny black-and-red bat wings. Across one eye, taking up half his face, was a spiderweb tattoo, and under the other eye was a small vertical line ending in a spider.

Riku commented on this. “I think you’re still a vampire, just dressed a bit differently.”

“A bit?” Sora whined. “This is not a bit different! This is a freaking lolita-style outfit!”

“You do have fangs though. So, still a vampire, right?”

Sora glared at Riku. “I dunno, want me to test them on you?”

Kairi giggled. “Okay, boys, stop flirting,” she teased, causing both boys to blush vigorously—especially as they realized in horror that Kairi had her camera out and was waving a few photos around. Sora tried jumping for them but Kairi expertly dodged away and said, “Now, are we meeting Santa or not?”

“Sora! How nice it is to see you!” came a voice. Riku and the others turned to see an extremely tall and thin skeleton-man emerge from behind a gravestone. Riku tried to stay calm, remembering that Sora had warned them that the locals tended to look like creatures they’d usually try to fight. Actually, Sora had also specifically told them about this… person?

“Jack!” Sora cheered, running up and giving the skeleton a hug.

Jack embraced Sora in return. “It’s so good to see you! And who might your friends be?”

“Oh! This is Kairi, and this is Riku!” Sora introduced.

“Oh! Riku! I’ve heard so much about you! I’m glad Sora finally found you. And Kairi, too! You’re the one who was waiting on the Island for Sora and Riku to return, weren’t you?” Riku and Kairi both blushed, realizing Sora had been talking about them enough that they were already known to this skeleton-man.

“Yes,” Kairi replied, “But they were taking so long I had to go find them myself!” she joked.

“Hey, blame Xemnas for that!” Sora retorted. Kairi stuck her tongue out at him and Riku laughed.

Jack laughed too. “Oh, by the way, loving the new outfits!” he suddenly proclaimed. “Especially yours, Sora! It’s positively frightening.” This seemed to be a serious compliment.

Sora blushed again. “Oh. Um, thanks, I guess,” he mumbled, before glaring at Riku and Kairi as they added their agreement. “So, anything new here, Jack?” Sora asked, in a clear attempt to change the subject.

“Oh! So glad you brought that up!” the skeleton said. “I need your help convincing the townsfolk of something. You see, I found another door—”

“No,” Sora said before Jack could finish.

“But you didn’t even hear what was behind it!”

“Don’t care. We don’t need anymore incidents like the Christmas one.”

The skeleton actually pouted at that. “I wasn’t going to try to take it over.”

“Oh, really?”

“Of course not!” The skeleton seemed to light up with his next words. “I’m pretty sure there isn’t anyone who’s in charge of this one yet!”

Sora sighed. “Jack…”

“Do you know what he’s talking about?” Riku whispered to Kairi while the two argued.

Kairi shook her head. “Not a clue.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

After some amount of walking—during which Kairi and Sora kept trying to pet Riku’s ears, which to Riku’s embarrassment felt quite nice—Riku, Sora, Kairi, and Jack stood in front of a tree adorned with a giant heart. Jack had convinced Sora to follow him, claiming he only wanted to know what the holiday was called, not try to take it over, as he’d apparently tried to do with Christmas.

Jack tapped on the door and it opened. “It’s right through here!” he told them, leaping into the tree.

The island trio glanced at each other, collectively shrugged, and then leapt in.

After spiraling through darkness for a moment, the group tumbled out of the tree onto a pink cobblestone path in a grassy knoll. In fact, the entire world seemed to be pink, including the light sweet-smelling fog covering them. A few pink dogwood trees stood nearby, wrapped in pink vines with little buds of some sort. Next to them were small rose bushes. All of their outfits, though generally the same, had changed to various shades of pink, white, and red, no more black in sight.

Sora ran up to one of the trees, plucking something off of it and putting it in his mouth.

“Sora! Don’t do that!” Riku said worriedly, running up to his friend.

“It’s okay, it’s chocolate!” Sora said, talking with his mouth full.

Riku looked at the vines closer; indeed, it was chocolate budding on them. Not the cheap kind either, rather the fancy cream-filled ones you usually found everywhere during… yeah, definitely not a holiday they wanted being Halloween-ified. “Okay, we’re going back,” Riku decided, grabbing Sora’s arm and pulling him away from the tree, then Kairi’s too as they passed by her, heading towards the tree they’d come from.

“But you haven’t told me the name of the holiday!” Jack protested. “Or what it’s about!”

“It’s Valentine’s Day!” Sora shouted as Riku pulled them into the tree. “It’s about eating chocolate!”

Once they were back in the grove of trees, Kairi giggled. “Eating chocolate? Really Sora? It’s about love and showing people you care about them.”

Sora shook his head. “No, pretty sure the most important part is the chocolate.”

Riku and Kairi looked at each other and shook their heads in fondness.

“Anyway!” Sora said with determination. “You need to meet Santa, now!” Sora grabbed both their hands and led them into a tree adorned with a decorated Christmas tree.

The trio’s outfits changed once they emerged from the tree. They were for the most part identical, consisting of warm woolen pants and simple coats adorned with white fluff as a trim, even on the neck. They also each had on a santa hat, also trimmed in fluffy white with a white pompom on the tip. The only real difference was the base color: Riku’s was a christmas-tree green; Kairi’s was an icy blue; and Sora’s… well, for some reason it was black, and he still had vampire fangs.

“Mess-up with the outfit again?” Riku amusedly asked Sora as they started walking down the snowy lane outlined with candy-cane fences.

Sora gave him a confused look. “Huh? It’s always looked like this here—oh no, is there something on my face? Is the hat weird?” Sora grabbed the hat; he unexpectedly seemed to be on the verge of panicking.

Riku shook his head and put his hands up. “No no no! Nothing like that! It looks the same as ours. It’s just… black. Why’s it black? And you still have fangs.”

“Oh, that,” Sora said after a deep breath. “I dunno.” Sora shrugged and ran his tongue over the fangs. “It’s always like this. Just figured it was because we entered here from Halloween Town… although, come to think of it, Donald and Goofy’s weren’t spooky or anything… well Goofy’s kinda was, but only because he became part-reindeer, not because of any intentional spookiness.”

“Maybe you’re supposed to look like Krampus,” Kairi teased, but Sora just looked confused in response; clearly he never had heard of that particular legend.

“He’s like an anti-Santa,” Riku explained.

Sora pouted. “Hmph. Am not! I’m on the Nice List, I’ll have you know… oh, look, there’s the main area!” He began pointing to various buildings. “Look, there’s the carousel, and there’s the shop where they sell hot chocolate in lots of flavors, and there’s the cookie factory, and there’s the shop that only sells snow globes... and of course Santa’s Workshop is smack in the middle!” Sora gestured to a building that undoubtedly could only be described as Santa’s Workshop. Sora ran over to it at a magically-augmented speed that required Riku and Kairi to really work at staying close behind. They were both out of breath by the time they got there, but Sora wasn’t thanks to his amazing control of air magic. Show-off.

Sora entered the building without knocking; Riku and Kairi looked at each other, shrugged, and followed him. Inside was a small sitting area, and along the back was a large desk with lots of papers and a very large red-clad man standing behind it, looking for something on a shelf. He very much did look like Santa Claus, but Riku still had his doubts.

“Santa!” Sora yelled, clearly startling the man as he looked down to process the brunette currently clinging to him.

“Oh, Sora, it’s you,” Santa said, not sounding nearly as enthused as Sora was. The man patted Sora on the back and carefully dislodged the brunette. “Now, what have I told you about personal space?” he said firmly, as a parent would tell a kid.

Sora looked down, put his hands behind his back, and kicked his foot slightly. “Um… ask people first, or wait until they show signs of wanting hugs?”

Santa (?) nodded. “Yes. We cannot simply run up and hug everyone we meet, especially without warning. Not everyone likes surprise hugs.”

Riku chuckled slightly. That had been a lesson everyone had tried teaching Sora for years, yet it had yet to stick. Riku didn’t think even Santa could convince Sora to stop hugging everyone.

Santa turned to Riku and Kairi. “Are you going to introduce me to your friends, Sora?”

Sora frowned. “Don’t you already know everyone though?”

Santa sighed. “Yes, but as I’ve also told you before, introducing people is polite when they haven’t formally met before, even if we already know names.”

Sora grumbled, “Fine.” Then he put on a smile. “Santa, this is Kairi and Riku, my two best friends! Kairi, Riku, this is Santa Claus!”

“Nice to meet you, Santa,” Kairi said, giving a slight bow.

“Same,” Riku said, holding out his hand, which Santa—Santa, actually Santa!—took and shook.

Santa smiled. “Good to meet you both, too. Sora talks a lot about you, you know.” Kairi and Riku both blushed at that. “Now, what brings you three here?” Santa asked, although Riku had a feeling he already knew.

Sora smiled so widely it seemed his face would split in two, and he was bubbling with excitement. “I want to show them all the places I’ve been to! We started here because I really wanted them to meet you!”

“And you want to find out if you’re on the Nice List this year?” Santa asked, a sparkle in his eyes.

“Huh? Oh, right!” It seemed Sora had forgotten. “I wanted to see if Riku and Kairi are on it! Oh, but since they didn’t believe in you, I guess they wouldn’t be…”

Santa chuckled. “Didn’t believe in me, huh? Well, that simply isn’t true, is it, Miss Kairi?”

Sora gasped. “You still believed? Even now?”

Kairi blushed. “Oh. Um. Yeah.”

“So that means Kairi is on the Nice List, then!” Sora declared.

“Oh ho ho. Never assume things, Sora. Now, let me see…” Santa turned to the shelf behind him and extracted a large scroll. He unravelled it—the list, labelled ‘Nice’ at the top, rolled across the floor while Santa searched it. “Oh, yes, here it is. Kairi, you are definitely on the nice list, no doubt about it!”

“Really? That’s awesome, Kairi!” Sora cheered, giving Kairi a big hug, which she returned while laughing. Riku couldn’t help laughing too—Sora’s happiness was contagious!

“Now, aren’t you wondering which list you’re on, Sora? Riku?” Santa asked.

Riku looked at Santa curiously. “I’m on the Naughty List, right? Since I didn’t actually believe in you.” And that whole mess with Ansem thing. But Sora had said the list refreshed each year, so maybe that part wasn’t a factor.

“Oh, not necessarily,” Santa said. 

“What!” Sora protested. “But—”

“Quiet, Sora,” Santa scolded as he consulted his list. “Hmm. Riku… Riku…” he mumbled, looking down the names. “Ah! Riku!” He looked up and smiled at Riku. “Yes, you indeed are on the Nice List.”

Riku and Sora looked at Santa blankly for a moment before simultaneously asking “How?!”

Santa chuckled. “Well, normally you’d be on the Naughty List for not believing, but I’d say saving the universe from a madman counteracts that. You too, Sora—saving the universe certainly counts for more than anything you’ve done that could have warranted the Naughty List.”

Sora looked confused at that. “Wait, I did things that would have gotten me on that list?”

Santa gave Sora a pointed look. “So that pirate gold just walked away on its own, did it?”

Sora paled. “Wait, that was Jack, not me, I swear—!”

Santa chuckled. “Oh, I know. I’m just kidding. Although, Roxas is a different story… hmm, if he resides in you… Well, I suppose you saving the universe does trump his transgressions too.” He smiled kindly.

Kairi suddenly jumped in excitement. “Riku! Sora! Stand next to Santa, I need a picture!’

“What! Kairi, do you have to get one of everything?” Sora complained.

“Yes! I told my parents I would send pictures, so I’m going to give them pictures!”

Santa chuckled. “Okay, okay, come here, we’ll get a photo.” He gestured to the boys, who reluctantly complied. Santa whistled, and an elf ran in from the adjoining workshop. Kairi’s eyes lit up in realization as she handed the elf the camera before running over to the group so she could be in the photo too.

Just as the elf snapped the shutter, the door banged open, and four little elves rushed in. “Santa! Santa! Emergency! Emergency!”

Santa and the three keyblade-wielders turned to look as one of the elves explained, “Heartless have appeared in the candy factory!”

Sora sighed. “Seriously? I wanted to get hot chocolate…”

Riku rolled his eyes. “We can get that after defeating the heartless. Plus, it’ll give Kairi a chance to practice her keyblade skills.” He smiled at the girl.

Kairi smiled too. “Yeah! Come on, Sora, let’s go.”

“Okay!” Sora smiled too, but it was hard to tell if it was true or not. He turned to Santa. “Thanks for letting us visit! It was nice seeing you again!” He dashed out the door with Kairi.

“Thank you,” Riku said to Santa before he left. “I never expected to be on the Nice List…”

“Well, you earned it,” Santa said simply, with a smile and twinkle in his eye. “Now, better catch up to your friends, hmm?”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku swore as he shook his foot free of a pile of taffy. “This is ridiculous! Can’t we draw them somewhere cleaner?”

“Riku, watch out!” Kairi called, leaping over to block a projectile that had been aimed at Riku. The gobstopper stuck to her keyblade, which was coated in a layer of sticky sugar.

“Where’s Sora?” Riku asked. The candy factory was humongous. The heartless that had infested it were weak enough, but they were the annoying monkey ones that kept leaping around, hiding, and throwing whatever they could find—which here happened to be candy and other sticky things.

Kairi shrugged, muttering something that sounded like “too much sugar” before leaping away to attack the monkey that had thrown the gobstopper.

Kairi’s comment made sense to Riku a few minutes later, when he had finished clearing out the room and moved onto the final one, which was the most infested. Sora seemed to be having quite a bit of fun fighting here, taunting the monkeys as he leapt all around in some sort of hyperactive dance as he fought. He had a candy cane hanging out of his mouth. Riku was suddenly reminded of why their parents had banned them from having sweets during sleepovers.

Kairi appeared too, and between the three of them they made quick work of the heartless. Sora delivered the finishing blow with some type of light attack that called pillars of light from the sky and took out a whopping ten heartless at once—as well as caused him to nearly collapse.

“Sora!” Riku called, grabbing his friend’s arm before he could fall. It seemed to just be exhaustion, but he used a “curaga” spell on the brunette just-in-case.

“Heh. Thanks, Riku,” Sora muttered. “I think I’m out of mana.”

“You think?” Riku said incredulously. “Sora, you were throwing around so much magic I’m surprised you didn’t run out before now!”

Sora frowned. “Really? I don’t think I was using any more magic than I usually use, although I did do some larger spells that I didn’t know before. Like that light one at the end! Merlin said it’s called ‘Judgement’, and he learned it from an angel in a place called Silver-Aunt.”

Riku gazed at Sora for a moment, processing that. “That’s how much magic you usually use?” he asked weakly. Riku wouldn’t be able to manage half that, even if he did know the spells.

Sora seemed to wilt. “It’s too much, isn’t it? I can tone it down if you want; Donald always does say I waste too much mana…”

Riku shook his head. “No, I didn’t mean it that way! It’s just… impressive.” Riku felt himself blushing. “It’s really cool that you can use that much high-level magic during battles…”

“Yeah, it was amazing!” Kairi added in. “I could spend all day watching you using magic!”

Sora beamed as he realized the two were complimenting him. “Aww, really? Thanks, guys!” He jumped forwards, arms open, then paused. “Um. It’s okay if I hug you, right?” Huh. It seemed he did remember Santa’s words, although they were unnecessary here.

Riku rolled his eyes and pulled Sora forwards into his arms. “Of course, silly. It’s always okay for you to hug me.”

“Me too!” Kairi said, wrapping her arms around them both, but only for a moment before she scrunched up her nose, withdrawing as she said, “I think we all need showers.”

Riku laughed, also pulling away, cringing as his sleeve stuck to Sora’s momentarily. “Yeah, definitely. Let’s go find an inn.” They were covered in various syrups, sugar, honey, and other such sticky things, on top of an excessive amount of sweat; the factory was sweltering, which Riku supposed made sense as most candy required high heat to temper. 

“Okay,” Sora agreed. Then, his eyes lit up as he bounced on the balls of his feet. “Can we get hot chocolate first?” It seemed that the sugar-induced hyperactivity had not left him after all.

Kairi giggled. “I think you’ve had enough sugar for now.”

“We can get it tomorrow, okay?” Riku reasoned, before Sora could try to argue.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“See? Told you this was the best hot chocolate ever!” Sora cheered, as the little elven barmaid brought him yet another peppermint hot-chocolate topped with a heaping amount of whipped cream and a candy-cane straw. Barmaid was accurate, as the place was set up exactly like a bar, with the exception that it served only hot-chocolate-based things.

“It’s pretty good,” Riku agreed, sipping his less sugary regular hot-chocolate with a few added espresso shots.

Sora levelled a stare at Riku. “I was talking to Kairi. What you got does not qualify as proper hot chocolate,” Sora told him.

“What?” Riku said with false indignation. “It’s chocolate mixed with milk, and it’s hot.”

“Yeah but it has coffee in it! The point of hot-chocolate is that it doesn’t have that,” Sora argued.

“Well, that’s still much more authentic than the thing Kairi has!”

Kairi stuck her tongue out adorably, swiping some whipped cream that had been stuck to her lip on its way back. “White hot chocolate is chocolate too!” she argued.

“It’s pink!”

“You know, Riku has a point,” Sora mused. “If it were just white chocolate, I could accept that, but it also has cherry syrup. That’s… well. At that point, it just isn’t hot chocolate.”

Kairi pouted playfully. “Hmph. You’re just jealous that it tastes better than yours.”

“No it doesn’t!”

“Yes it does.”

Sora grabbed Kairi’s drink and took a sip, looking thoughtful afterwards. “Okay, fine, it tastes good,” he conceded. “But it’s still not hot-chocolate! And mine tastes better than Riku’s anyway.”

Kairi rolled her eyes. “Anything tastes better than Riku’s.”

Riku smiled fondly at his two best friends as he sipped his… okay, it probably did qualify as a mocha rather than hot chocolate.

Sora looked at Riku again. “How are you even drinking that?”

Riku frowned, setting the mug back on the table. “What do you mean?”

“It has coffee in it!”

“So? It’s not like you can taste it with the other flavors,” Riku pointed out.

“Hmm. You know, he’s right,” Kairi mused, and Riku realized she had somehow stolen his drink. “You can’t really taste it at all.”

“What? No way!” Sora grabbed the drink too, and took a sip. He made a face of disgust. “Liars!” he accused. “You can totally taste it! Why would you willingly put bitterness in something that should be sweet?”

“Well, I need the caffeine,” Riku argued. “Don’t want to fall asleep while driving.”

“Well, then, don’t wake us up at the crack of dawn,” Kairi suggested, unintentionally emphasizing her point with a yawn. 

Riku sighed. “It’s a twelve-hour drive, Kairi, and you two wanted to visit some shops before leaving,” he gestured to the bag of various items sitting on a seat near them. “Didn’t exactly have a choice, unless you want to sleep on the ship.”

“We’re going to sleep on the ship anyway,” Sora pointed out. “At least me and Kairi will.” Kairi nodded her agreement with the statement. Riku didn’t doubt it; those two could fall asleep anywhere.

The trio finished up their drinks, paid the bar-elf, and headed back to their ship, which was parked nearby; Riku had moved it while Kairi and Sora shopped, after chatting with an elf who was stunned to learn that they went through all the effort of going to Halloween Town first. Sora had been shocked upon finding the ship just outside Christmas Town; apparently he hadn’t known that the ship could go straight there.

True to their word, once they’d returned to the GummiShip, Kairi and Sora plopped down on the bench seat along the side, and promptly fell asleep leaning against each other. Riku shook his head in fond exasperation; that was so typical of both of them. Well, Riku didn’t blame them—one of the less glamorous aspects of world travel was how damn long it took to get anywhere.


	3. Radiant Garden

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sora is feeling depressed. Riku tries to help. Kairi is very worried too. Then Merlin's training involves Sora changing into a squirrel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has more angst than others, but also plenty of fluff to balance it out.

“Oof,” Riku grunted as he plopped down on the first-floor couch (today it decided to be orange with black fleur-de-lises), rubbing his back. Technically it was a free day for them, but instead of Riku getting to relax Merlin had randomly decided to teach him some strange magic-enhanced physical attacks that he felt Riku would be more adept at than the others. Riku, however, felt the opposite, as they involved strange calisthenics that Riku definitely did not have the proper flexibility for. Kairi and Sora would be much more equipped for such. He pointed this out to Merlin, who merely scoffed and gave him a list of daily stretches to increase his poor flexibility.

“Hey, Riku,” Kairi greeted from a nearby (neon-green; was anything normal-colored here?) armchair. She was working on some sort of needlepoint craft.

“Is that the one Sora tried to make?” Riku asked. The other day, Sora had decided he wanted to learn to do needlepoint after seeing some of the things Tifa had been showing Kairi how to make, only to give up in frustration after a short while (which, frankly, everyone expected him to; Sora did not have the patience for such, although he did last longer than they’d expected).

“Yup. I think it was supposed to be a Moogle? I dunno. That’s what it’s gonna be now.”

Riku chuckled at that. “Hey, where is Sora, anyway?”

Kairi frowned, looking contemplative. “You know, I haven’t actually seen him today. This morning I was gardening with Aerith; I only just got back a little bit ago. Maybe he’s still in his room?”

Riku frowned too. His stomach clenched with a slight uneasiness. “You don’t think he’s still asleep, do you?”

Kairi looked at Riku skeptically. “It’s nearly 4 in the afternoon, Riku. I know Sora likes sleeping late, but come on. He’s probably reading a book.” That was a possibility. One Riku wouldn’t have considered a week prior, but a few days ago Sora had found a bunch of fantasy books in Merlin’s library he’d been excited about; they were a bit childish and below their reading level, but hey, if they got Sora actually reading by choice, Riku didn’t care what the subject matter or reading level was.

“I’m gonna check on him anyway,” Riku decided, groaning as he got off the couch. He headed up the magical staircase that led to the one-story house’s twenty-plus other floors.

It was good that Riku had decided to check on Sora, the silverette concluded as he entered the brunette’s room. Sora indeed was asleep still, laying on his side facing the wall, curled in a blanket. Riku didn’t bother to be quiet; it was 4pm. Sora needed to get up, or he’d destroy his sleep schedule. That, or he was sick, in which case medicine was in order. Riku sat on the edge of Sora’s bed and shook his shoulder slightly.

Sora responded by clutching the blanket tighter and curling up. Apparently, he’d been at least semi-awake. “Go away, Riku,” he muttered, barely audible. “I wanna sleep.”

Riku frowned. “It’s 4pm, Sora,” he pointed out, then reached to feel Sora’s forehead. “You don’t have a fever… come on, get up, sleepyhead.”

“Don’t wanna.”

Riku sighed. “Sora…” He tugged the blankets off slightly, then noticed something that slightly added to his worry. “Are you still in yesterday’s clothes?”

Sora shrugged. “I was too tired to change into pajamas.”

Riku raised an eyebrow. “Seriously? You napped almost the entire ride home on the GummiShip yesterday, and then went to bed early.” The trip the previous day hadn’t even been a tiring one, just a quick visit to Twilight Town for ice cream. Riku started to suspect the tiredness was not actually physical. “Come on, up. You’ll feel better if you eat something.” He nudged Sora’s shoulder again.

“Not hungry.”

Riku raised his eyebrows. Sora hadn’t eaten dinner the previous night, and Riku couldn’t remember if Sora had eaten lunch either, only the ice cream. “Sora, you haven’t eaten anything substantial in more than 24 hours. You need to get up.” He pulled on Sora’s shoulder, managing to get him to roll onto his back.

Sora looked at Riku with a frown. “Why do you even care?”

Riku looked at Sora in shock. “Why would you even ask that? You’re my best friend! Of course I care about you.”

“Right, Sorry. Not sure why I asked that.” Sora turned so he was on his side again, but this time facing Riku. 

Riku began absentmindedly running his hand through Sora’s hair. “Come on, Sora. You need to eat something, even if you aren’t hungry. And change your clothes…” Riku realized something else as he felt Sora’s hair, which was uncharacteristically dirty. “When was the last time you showered?”

Sora shrugged. “I dunno. A few days ago?” Whereas that wouldn’t be a concern for the average person, for Sora it was unusual, as they all showered daily, sometimes more, due to all the outdoor work and physical training (and when adventuring, magic worked as a good substitute).

Riku nodded. “Okay. Let’s get you showered, first. Then fresh clothes and some food. Maybe a walk after that? Some fresh air might be nice.”

“That sounds like a lot of work,” Sora mumbled.

Riku raised an eyebrow. “Seriously, Sora? Okay, fine. Let’s start with a shower and go from there. Can you do that? For me?”

Sora sighed. “Carry me?”

Riku wondered if Sora was fully processing things. “Carry you to the shower?”

Sora blushed and opened his eyes. “Um. Maybe not. I’ll go. Wait for me downstairs?”

Riku didn’t stand up; instead, he took Sora by the arm, helping him sit up. If he left Sora there, Sora would just try to go back to sleep again.

“Riku…” Sora complained, but didn’t fight it as Riku helped him up and led him to the bathroom two floors up (there was one every five floors, all decorated differently; this one was pink-and-yellow tile with blue seashell wallpaper).

“Now, do I have to help you in, or can you manage on your own?” Riku teased.

Sora’s face turned bright red. “I can do it on my own,” he said sheepishly.

Riku nodded. “I’ll be waiting in the room,” Riku said, heading out and closing the door. 

Once back in Sora’s room, Riku pawed through the dresser, finding an outfit for his friend; he didn’t trust that Sora wouldn’t come back to the room and immediately crawl into the bed again. He’d thought Sora had been feeling better… maybe it was the lack of structure today that was the problem? Nothing was forcing him up, so he just didn’t get up. Riku would need to keep that in mind. He would have to monitor Sora’s eating better, too. Sora used to constantly demand food; the fact that he went more than a day without eating yet didn’t care was extremely worrisome. Riku put the clothes on the bed and then flopped into the chintz armchair the room had magically conjured during the short trip to the bathroom, evidently sensing it’d be welcome. Some of the books Sora had found rested on the nearby desk, so Riku grabbed one and flipped through. Something about aliens and people who could change into animals; it actually looked pretty interesting. Maybe he shouldn’t pre-judge books based on reading level.

Just as Riku began to get worried at how long Sora was taking, the brunette entered the room, hair flat and dripping, wrapped up in a humongous fluffy towel. “The house stole my clothes!” the brunette complained.

Riku chuckled. The house automatically collected laundry it deemed dirty enough to need a wash. “That’s okay. I got some ready for you.” He gestured to the outfit he’d set on the bed.

Sora blushed. “Riku… you didn’t have to do that…”

Riku shrugged. “It’s no big deal. Come on, get them on, and we’ll get you some food, sound good?”

“But the towel is really comfy.”

Riku raised an eyebrow. “Do I have to—”

Sora squeaked in embarrassment. “No, I’ll do it!”

Riku chuckled. “Okay.” He set the book back on the desk and stood up. “I’ll be waiting right outside; don’t take too long,” he said, exiting the room.

Riku leaned on the wall outside of Sora’s room. Just as he began getting worried, Sora exited it. His hair was dry, probably from an aero spell, and he wore the outfit Riku had chosen for him, one of Sora’s favorites (that he probably wouldn’t be caught dead in on the Islands). Simple black pants (basically leggings, but Sora refused to call them that) paired with a loose light-blue short-sleeve scoop-neck tunic-style top that came to just below Sora’s butt, tied at the waist with a green fabric belt. It was a modern take on the medieval-style tunics they’d seen in books back home (one of the reasons Sora liked it), and apparently a super popular men’s style in Radiant Garden at the moment. Riku really didn’t understand fashion much, but it did look quite good on Sora. Comparatively, Riku had just thrown on some loose-fitting jeans and a plain black v-neck.

“Whatcha looking at?” Sora asked, voice teasing, and Riku blushed, realizing he’d been staring at Sora. “Well?” Sora pressed.

“That’s, um, well, that outfit…”

“You like it?” Sora beamed.

“Y-yeah,” Riku agreed as he tried taming the growing blush. “It looks good on you.”

“Hmmmm.” Sora looked over Riku, eyes lingering almost a little too long in places; so much for calming the blush. “We need to get you some better clothes, too.”

“There's still time to go shopping today,” Riku suggested. He didn’t really like shopping, but if it got Sora out of the house rather than trying to sleep the day away, Riku was up for anything.

Sora’s eyes lit up. “Really? I gotta find Kairi! She’s been saying you need better clothes, too, and she’s so much better at fashion than I am!” He practically bounced down the stairs.

“Hold on, there,” Riku said, laughing as he followed Sora, grabbing the brunette’s arm as they passed by the kitchen. “Food first, then shopping.” Riku was extremely glad that Sora seemed to be feeling a little better at least… well, hopefully. Sora had gotten disturbingly good at hiding his emotions over the years. He did seem genuinely excited at the idea of dressing up Riku, though; this thought caused Riku to blush slightly again. 

“Kairi!” Sora called as he entered the kitchen, Riku following behind him. Kairi was searching through the fridge looking for a snack. “We’re taking Riku clothes shopping!”

“We are?” Kairi said, emerging from the fridge with a go-gurt and looking at Sora in surprise, then at Riku. “Um. Okay, sure.”

Sora looked Kairi over. “You’re going to have to put something better on, though,” he decided. “Sweats and a t-shirt are not shopping clothes.”

Kairi rolled her eyes. “There’s like one clothing store, it’s not exactly like we’re going to the Island mall or something.”

“No, there’s two!” Sora corrected.

“Okay, two. Still doesn’t require a whole outfit change.”

“Kai-ri!”

Kairi sighed. “Okay, fine.”

“You should borrow Yuffie’s clothing,” Sora suggested. “You’d look good in them.”

Kairi’s face turned bright red. She opened her mouth, then closed it again, clearly unsure what to say to that. Yuffie’s clothes tended to mostly be crop-tops and short-shorts.

“I agree,” Riku said, only half-teasing. She really would. And Kairi had worn similar stuff before, so it shouldn’t be that embarrassing for her.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“How the fuck does Yuffie fight in this!?” Kairi complained as she dodged a shadow heartless while cutting through one behind her with her keyblade. Said outfit was a pair of super-short camo jeans and a top that basically was a strap of fabric wrapped around her chest, held up by a strap of leather on one shoulder. She wore knee-high beige socks under her usual black boots. Her stomach was completely bare, and her belly-button was adorned with a simple silver bauble. Riku was positive Kairi’s belly-button had not been pierced until Yuffie overheard the boys suggesting Kairi should try her clothing on and basically forced Kairi to change.

“Well, at least it looks good!” Sora teased.

Kairi slashed through the last heartless. “See if I take your fashion advice ever again!” she called as she retied her ponytail, which had started to come loose. 

“Guess it’s too late to go shopping now,” Riku said as he caught his breath. Their impromptu shopping trip had been interrupted by a swarm of heartless; Riku wasn’t sure whether to be glad about that (he personally disliked shopping) or disappointed (Sora seemed to be really looking forwards to dressing him up, for some reason, and Sora really needed something to cheer him up right now).

“And we all need showers, too,” Kairi said. “Why do heartless always seem to appear on the more humid days?”

“Aww, but Riku already forced me to shower today,” Sora complained.

Kairi gave Sora an odd look. “What?” She then looked at Riku for clarification, who mouthed that he’d tell her later.

Sora ignored Kairi. “Oh! Let’s get ice-cream! Doesn’t Scrooge sell sea-salt flavor here?”

“Sora, Leon told us last week that he moved to Twilight Town to open some restaurant there,” Riku reminded him.

Sora frowned. “Oh, right. Then let’s go to Twilight Town for ice cream!”

Riku sighed. “Sora, the sun’s already setting. Besides, we literally were in Twilight Town yesterday to get ice cream.”

“Awww, but I’m hungry!”

“Then let’s go back; Leon’s probably finished with dinner by now.”

“But I’m hungry for ice cream!”

Kairi giggled, and Riku sighed fondly.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku sighed into his pillow, thinking. He laid face-down on his bed, debating what to do about Sora. Things were much worse than anyone had thought, considering the previous day. Today Riku had his morning free while Sora learned some things from Merlin; normally he’d be working, but Merlin had snatched his free morning up the previous day, so Leon insisted he use this morning as a break to compensate. Riku wasn’t exactly relaxing much at all though, rather was spending the morning stressed out and worried about his friend. Earlier this morning, Riku had encountered some psychology books in Merlin’s library (he had books on pretty much any topic, and the library itself seemed to be sentient; all you had to do was enter the library and it’d bring you a book it thought you needed, even if you didn’t know you needed it). According to them, if Sora didn’t get help, there was a chance the condition could devolve, causing Sora to hurt himself or worse. Riku didn’t think Sora would actually ever do something like that, but the seed of worry had already planted itself in the back of his mind—especially since Sora had asked Riku why he cared about him. The brunette had played it off as a stray thought, but Sora was good at hiding his feelings (too good, a lot of the times; pretty much only Riku and Kairi could discern his fake smiles from real ones—thankfully that meant Sora was more open with the two of them, but it was possible he was hiding deeper insecurities too); it was possible he truly had been feeling that way and it slipped out.

Riku groaned. What should he do? If he told an adult, and Sora found out, the brunette would definitely get mad, thinking he couldn’t trust Riku, and that could make the situation worse, cause Sora to hide more things and push away from people. But he could get the help he needed. Riku could try talking to Sora, or maybe Kairi could, or them both. Riku decided to discuss things with Kairi before making any decisions, see her thoughts on the matter.

As if on cue, a knock rapped on the door. Riku got up and answered it to find Kairi, in a cute little yellow-and-red sundress. 

“Hey. What’s up?” Riku asked.

“Is Sora around?” she looked into Riku’s room.

Riku shook his head. “He’s training with Merlin today; shouldn’t be back until lunch.”

“Okay, good,” Kairi said as she barged past Riku into his room, then pivoted to face him. “We need to talk about Sora,” she said bluntly.

Riku laughed once. “I was actually just about to come to you about that.”

“Well, great minds think alike,” Kairi said simply.

Riku sighed. “More like worried minds, right?”

Kairi sighed too and sat on the bed, arms back. “Yeah.” She paused for a moment as Riku sat next to her. “I’m scared,” she admitted.

Riku nodded. “Me too. Merlin’s library gave me some books earlier today.” He picked one up off the bedside table, opening to a page he had marked. “They’re rather technical, probably college-level or higher, but from what I can tell… well, we can’t keep ignoring things. Especially after yesterday; he didn’t get out of bed until 4, and not because he was sleepy—he just didn’t have the mental energy to get up and do things. He hadn’t eaten in more than a day, and hadn’t showered in a while either. I had to coax him into doing everything.”

Kairi nodded. “He made a comment to me a few days ago,” she said. “Something about being nothing without his friends? He played it off as a joke, but I think underneath that he was serious.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard him say some things like that, too… I’m actually starting to think that thing he says, ‘my friends are my power,’ means something more literal to him rather than the encouraging metaphor we’ve all been interpreting it as.”

The two were quiet for a moment before Kairi said, “So, what do we do?”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Later that day, just before lunchtime, found Riku and Kairi sitting on the (currently floral) couch reading a book together—one of the middle-grade ones that Sora had taken a liking to. They had learned an important lesson about books: subject matter and reading level do not always correspond as expected. Riku was quite shocked at some of the things in it; the books represented an interplanetary war, and did not sugarcoat what that meant. It reminded Riku somewhat of their lives, actually—their enemies obviously weren’t mind-controlling slugs, but darkness could infect (almost) anyone and most people had no way to tell who had been tainted by it (or straight up possessed by a madman like Xehanort).

“Chiiit chit chii!” A small furry animal—a red squirrel? Riku only had seen them in books—dashed over the couch and across Riku’s and Kairi’s laps, knocking the book away. It continued up Kairi’s arm to her shoulder.

“Aaaah!” the redhead screamed, jumping up and trying to shake it off, only to knock the hyperactive squirrel down the back of her dress, which was unfortunately tied with a belt, trapping it there.

“Wait! Kairi! Stop!”

“Sora?!” Riku and Kairi both said, looking around while Riku put his hand down Kairi’s dress to try to get the squirrel out.

“Shit!” Riku yelled, as he retracted his hand, sprouting a bloody wound and still squirrel-less. “It bit me!”

“Well maybe if you hadn’t nearly pulled my tail off—”

“Sora?!” Kairi gasped again.

“Wait, you’re the squirrel?” Riku said in disbelief.

“Yesssss! Now help me get out of here!”

“Hey, you’re the one who bit me!”

“Well like I said, you pulled my tail! Just undo the belt or something, I can leave that way—”

“Hell no are you leaving that way!” Kairi yelled. “Riku, I don’t care if he bites you a dozen times in the process—just get him out of there!”

“What the fuck is going on here?” Leon asked—he and Cloud had just entered the house.

“Sora’s a squirrel and got trapped down my dress!” Kairi complained.

“What.” Cloud asked, though it sounded more like a statement.

“Chii Chiit! Get me ouuuuuuut!!!!” Sora whined.

Riku growled as he pulled his hand out and used another cure spell on it. “I will if you stop biting me!”

“Then stop grabbing awkward places!”

“You’re a squirrel! I’m sorry for not knowing exactly where to grab!”

“Around the waist just below the arms, I think?”

“Then stay still so I can do that!”

“But I can’t! It’s too cramped in here—the squirrel brain is panicking!”

“You know what, fuck this,” Kairi said, undoing the belt and lifting her dress completely off, depositing Sora on the couch, who immediately buried into the cushions until only his tail was visible.

“Wait, Kairi,” Riku said as she was about to put her dress back on. She paused, giving Riku a reproachful look, clearly questioning why he’d tell her to stop dressing. “Your back is covered in scratches; let me heal them first,” Riku explained, then did so.

“Well that was eventful,” Kairi said once she put her dress back on.

Riku cringed. “Um. Your back still has a lot of blood on it, and it’s soaking through your dress.” Riku pointed out, vaguely wondering if blood-mixing was a potential health issue.

Kairi sighed, leaning back on the couch, inevitably getting blood on that too. “I’ll shower and change later.

Riku dug through the couch cushions to find Sora, this time managing to pick him up properly. Riku held the small red squirrel in front of his face, who stared at him with beady eyes. Despite his current body, somehow Sora managed to retain the sheepish expression he always got when feeling embarrassed or guilty. “Why are you a squirrel?” Riku asked. One that could apparently talk, at that.

“Umm. It was part of Merlin’s training.”

“Then why are you still a squirrel?” Leon asked, crashing in an armchair. Cloud opted to stand behind him.

“Well, Merlin may have forgotten the proper counterspell,” Sora explained. “So he went to find an owl that apparently knows it. Artemis, I think. No, wait, Archimedes. Hey, Riku, could you put me down? It’s kinda uncomfortable just hanging here.” Riku put Sora on the couch next to him, only for Sora to scramble up his arm and onto his shoulder. It seemed that being a squirrel had made Sora more hyperactive than usual, speaking fast and not wanting to sit still—or maybe anyone transformed into a squirrel acted like that.

“Wait,” Cloud said, actually showing an expression of confusion for once. “I thought all of Merlin’s counterspells were ‘Abracadabra’?”

“No, it was ‘Alakazam’, I think,” Leon corrected.

“Either way, it’s the same thing for everything.”

“Wait a second,” Kairi said. “Is Merlin a squirrel too?”

“Yup!” Sora said, scrambling over Riku’s head to jump onto Kairi’s shoulder, where he sat for all of three seconds before opting to run down her arm to sit on her thigh instead.

“Shit, Sora,” Riku said, rubbing his head.

“I think we need to clip your claws,” Kairi said, using a cure spell on the scratches on her arm.

“Back up a second,” Leon said slowly. “Did you say Merlin is a squirrel? Looking for an owl?”

“Yup!” Sora confirmed, then seemed to realize what Leon was getting at. “Don’t worry though! It’s a magical talking owl that’s his best friend or something.” From the looks on their faces, this was clearly news to Leon and Cloud.

“So, why were you a squirrel again?” Riku asked.

“I told you; Merlin’s training!” 

“Yeah, but what kind of training requires you to be a squirrel?”

Sora tilted his head in thought. “Umm. Not really sure actually. Before he could start explaining a female squirrel appeared, and she wouldn’t leave me alone. Then Merlin began singing about love or something? Then a wolf appeared that we had to run from; it almost caught the female squirrel but I ran back to save her so it was fine. Then she was chasing me even more after that. It would have been cute if it weren’t so annoying.”

The room quieted for a moment (with the exception of a camera click), processing all of that. Riku bit down some extremely misplaced jealousy.

“We have squirrels around here?” Leon finally asked.

“Oh, no,” Sora replied. “Merlin took us to some world called ‘England’. It had a castle and stuff. I think it was also a few hundred years in the past, too. Maybe more.”

“Chiiiii chit chit chit!” came a sound from the open window, and in hopped a second red squirrel.

“Oh, is Merlin back?” Kairi asked.

Sora froze in place. “It’s her!” He then immediately took off, heading up the stairs, the female squirrel in hot pursuit.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku poked Sora in the rear. When the squirrel didn’t wake from his nap on the now-neon-yellow couch, he did it again, then booped Sora on the nose.

“Hey, what gives?” Sora complained, uncurling and sitting up.

“Dinner time,” Riku explained.

Sora yawned. “Not hungry.”

“Don’t, Sora. You missed lunch in all that commotion earlier. You’re going to eat dinner.” Riku picked Sora up and started heading to the kitchen.

Sora squirmed around a bit. “Hey! Let go!” When Riku refused, Sora went limp in resignation. “I don’t even know what squirrels eat.”

“Nuts? Seeds?” Riku suggested. Squirrels were always drawn eating acorns, which were one of those things.

“But I don’t like those,” Sora complained, as Riku set him on the kitchen counter.

“Well, maybe the squirrel-brain does.”

“Ugh. What about coconuts? Those are nuts, right? It’s in the name.”

Riku looked in the fridge and pulled out the coconut it produced, then placed it next to Sora on the counter.

Sora stared at it for a moment. “How the hell am I supposed to open this?”

Riku frowned. “I’m sure there’s something in here,” he said as he opened a drawer randomly.

“It’s okay; I got it!” Sora said happily, sounding like his mouth was full; Riku turned to him, seeing that Sora had a miniature keyblade held between his teeth. Sora proceeded to slash the coconut, cutting it in half—and splashing the milk all over Riku. “Oops.”

Riku sighed in fond exasperation as he held the knife the kitchen had easily provided. Typical Sora.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: A visit to Wonderland!


	4. Wonderland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kairi, Riku, and Sora head to Wonderland, and many shenanigans ensue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was so much fun to write! It's fluffy, and verging on the edge of crack with the sheer ridiculousness of events. It's Wonderland, after all.
> 
> Warning that there is some underage alcohol and drug use, because that's really kinda unavoidable in Wonderland.

“Next stop: Wonderland!” Sora—still a squirrel, and still quite hyperactive because of it—declared from his perch on Riku’s shoulder, pointing in the direction of the GummiShip hangers with a neatly-trimmed claw (clipping them had been a requirement if Sora wanted to climb on people, which he seemed to quite enjoy doing).

Riku looked over at Kairi, who shrugged. That hadn’t really been the plan today, but hey, if it made Sora happy, so be it (Riku and Kairi had agreed that they’d do whatever they could to help Sora—shy of telling an adult, which would be the last resort—who definitely had a bad case of depression under all those smiles, and this included not arguing much when it came to his sudden whims).

“Why Wonderland?” Kairi asked, playing with her hair, which had been tied into an over-the-shoulder braid and decorated with a butterfly hair-clip Sora and Riku had seen at a market stall a week prior and decided they simply had to get it for her. It made Riku happy to see her wearing it.

“Because it’s fun there! There’s all sorts of weird things like potions that change your size and rooms that flip and flowers that talk and do weird things and a cat that becomes just a mouth and moving trees and magic mushrooms you can bounce on and these weird drinks that make everything feel all fuzzy—”

Kairi gave Sora a strange look. “Were you high when there or something?”

Riku began laughing. “As weird as it sounds, those are all actual things that world has, no drugs needed!” A beat. “Wait, what weird drinks?”

“The tea that the Mad Hatter had during the Unbirthday Party! It made everything seem hilarious and wavy. Oh, and he had cake, too, that also made me feel weird, all floaty and relaxed. You two should try some.”

Riku and Kairi looked at each other warily. “Maybe we should eat beforehand,” Kairi suggested. Riku agreed and Sora pouted.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku looked around in awe. Last time he’d been here had been a brief in-and-out mission to kidnap the Princess of Heart that resided here, which was not a good memory. He was looking forward to exploring this world in a more positive capacity with his friends.

“Chii! Chi chiit!” Sora chattered, pointing somewhere.

“Use your words, Sora,” Riku chuckled, then cringed as Sora unexpectedly sprung from his shoulder and onto a low tree branch, pointing again.

“Look! A dog with a broom for a tail!”

Sure enough, a yellow dog ambled towards them, who looked similar to Pluto except possibly a bit older and, most differently, had a tail that ended in a broom, which it used to sweep the ground as it walked, eliminating debris. It wandered straight towards Riku, completely unaware of him or anyone else. Riku stepped out of the way, but not before the tail brushed over his feet, erasing his shoes before the mutt continued onwards.

Riku stared down at his feet for a moment, unsure of what had just transpired. “The fairies are going to be pissed,” he eventually concluded. At least the socks were black so wouldn’t show dirt as badly as other colors would.

Sora started laughing vigorously, which was expressed in a series of high-pitched screeches.

“Okay, enough of that,” Riku said, trying to look serious, although he couldn’t help a small smile coming through at Sora’s reaction despite his mild annoyance at his shoes being gone. He liked those shoes. Riku picked up Sora, who tried to hold onto the tree, still squealing, and held the little squirrel to his chest. He scratched behind Sora’s ears and the squirrel’s screams quieted to little happy murmurs.

Kairi giggled. “That’s so adorable!” she cooed, holding her camera. Riku blushed and Sora hid his head in Riku’s chest, embarrassed yet still murmuring happily as Riku’s scratching continued down Sora’s back. Sora leaned into it.

Suddenly, Sora’s tail puffed up and he began squeaking significantly, struggling to get free and looking at something to Riku’s right. “Heartless!” he yelled, finally remembering to use human words without anyone having to remind him.

Riku kept hold of Sora with one arm, summoning his keyblade with the other. Kairi turned too, holding her keyblade in a two-handed grip. A group of about a dozen monkey-like heartless hung from the trees; Riku dodged as one threw some sort of fruit at him, then leapt towards it. It went down quickly; they were thankfully quite weak ones. Kairi took longer to take each down, as she wasn’t as experienced yet.

Once half were defeated, Sora finally managed to struggle away from Riku. He leapt at a heartless, summoning his keyblade in his mouth. Riku supposed it must be similar to fighting like a lion, as Sora seemed to already have a pretty good handle on how to fight in a squirrel body. Unfortunately, he was also about a tenth of the size, so his attacks didn’t do that much, and it appeared he couldn’t do magic in that form the same way he normally would: Sora tried shooting a fireball, but instead of the magical energy gathering in his paw like he clearly had wanted it to, he coughed and spat it from his mouth, which caused the keyblade to fly sideways into Riku’s cheek. Thankfully it was small enough that it only left a scratch.

“Hey, watch it!” Riku complained, dashing over to finish off the heartless that now-defenseless Sora had been fighting. He grabbed Sora around the middle with one hand, depositing the squirrel onto his shoulder. “Stay.”

“Ri-ku, I nearly had him!” Sora whined, although he obediently stayed on Riku’s shoulder, digging his claws into the fabric to hold on as Riku took over Sora’s battle. Soon, all the heartless had been defeated.

“Let’s keep moving before more heartless appear,” Riku suggested, and Kairi complied.

The group quickly encountered a door in a hedge, which they entered to find themselves in the midst of a tea party. A long table stretched in front of them, filled with dozens of teapots, teacups, cakes, cookies, and other things one would typically find at such. The rather small area was surrounded by hedges except for one side, which featured a tiny house that seemed to be a mismatched jumble of designs.

“Hey! It’s the Mad Hatter!” Sora called, leaping off of Riku’s shoulder and onto the table.

“Oh! If it isn’t Sora!” cheered a stout man wearing patchwork clothing and top-hat. He seemed to intuitively know that the squirrel talking to him was Sora and completely ignored that. “Let me guess: it’s your Unbirthday today, too?”

“It’s all of our Unbirthdays!” Sora replied, to Riku’s total confusion.

“What’s an Unbirthday?” Riku whispered to Kairi, who shrugged, also looking wholly bewildered.

“What’s an Unbirthday?!” exclaimed the Mad Hatter, who had somehow managed to overhear despite having been loudly humming while pouring them tea from a teapot with three spouts. Only half the tea made it into the cups. “How does one not know what an Unbirthday is?! It’s unfathomable!”

“An Unbirthday is what you have the other 366 days that it isn’t your birthday!” Sora explained chipperly.

“No no no, it’s 364,” the Mad Hatter corrected. “Sora, Sora, Sora, I told you that last time! Three times, in fact!”

“Oh, right,” Sora said unabashedly through a mouthful of cookie, the size of which took both his squirrel-hands to hold.

“Hey, didn’t we agree that we shouldn’t eat or drink things here?” Kairi whispered to Riku as Sora and the Hatter chattered on. 

Riku nodded, slightly stunned at everything going on, attempting and failing to process any of the extremely rapid conversation between the Hatter and Sora which seemed to have turned into a song. Whatever was in that cookie had accelerated Sora’s squirrel-induced hyperactivity to a speed Riku hadn’t thought possible. Riku absentmindedly accepted a cup of tea from a large rabbit he hadn’t noticed prior as a clearly-drunk narcoleptic dormouse tried flirting with Kairi. As he sipped his tea, Riku noticed that he began to feel a little lightheaded; he promptly put the tea back on the table.

“Don’t drink the tea,” Riku advised as he gently took Kairi’s cup from her and placed it on the table before she could take a sip. “Let’s grab Sora and get out of here,” he then suggested to the redhead, as the Hatter and rabbit did some sort of jig while juggling teapots and teacups, half which were full and the other half broken. 

“Agreed,” Kairi said. “Um... where is Sora, though?”

Riku looked around, then swore. “He’s using a teapot like a hot tub!”

Kairi rushed over to grab the entire teapot with Sora in it, then grabbed Riku’s arm and pulled him out the hedge door; the Hatter and Hare did not seem to notice at all, and the mouse was nowhere in sight. Once adequately away from the tea party, she poured the tea onto some grass, followed by Sora tumbling out of the pot too, and then used a water spell followed by an aero spell on the squirrel.

“Hey, what was that for!” Sora complained, trying to smooth out his adorably puffy fur.

“You were bathing in some sort of spiked tea!” Kairi said as she tried to get a picture of Sora before his fluffy aero-dried fur settled. “I had to get it off of you!”

Sora hopped over to Kairi, wobbling slightly, and tried to climb up her leg. When that didn’t work—she had no fabric on them after all—he tried Riku’s instead; he got to Riku’s waist before he lost his grip and began to fall with a screech, but Riku managed to catch him. He stuck Sora onto his shoulder.

Kairi hopped over to them and giggled, snatching Sora off Riku’s shoulder so she could hold him to her chest.

“Hey, Kairi, I know I’m a squirrel right now, but this is kinda an awkward position…” Sora pointed out, slurring slightly, while Riku snickered.

“Why?” Kairi asked. “Riku held you like this earlier… oh.” Her face turned bright red; she more-or-less had Sora nestled right in-between her boobs. If her black sleeveless hoodie were zippered it’d be different, but it wasn’t, and due to Kairi’s low-cut periwinkle sundress half of Sora lay against her skin. “Ummmm. Well, whatever, you’re a squirrel right now. Deal with it,” she decided, not moving him as she began scratching behind his ears, resulting in happy murmurs and clearly causing him to forget any prior awkwardness.

“Oooh, is that a squirrel, or a boy, whom I see?” came a teasing purr as a grinning purple cat appeared on a tree branch slightly above them.

“A talking cat?” Kairi questioned, apparently unphased by the fact that the cat had its head turned entirely upside-down with a toothy smile much too wide for its face. Riku almost was just as surprised at the fact a cat was talking, then realized that this was Wonderland, so of course it would have a talking cat.

“My girl, you should know by now that everything talks here,” the cat said as it twisted its body to float entirely upside-down, with the head rightside-up. “And I am a Cheshire cat, thank you very much.”

“Well then, nice to meet you, Mister Cheshire,” Kairi replied.

The cat giggled; there was an eerie tone to it. “Oh, no, silly girl. Cheshire is not my forename, Cheshire is a place. I am a cat from Cheshire. A Cheshire cat.”

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Kairi quickly apologized. “So, who are you?”

“Who am I? Whoooo are you? Friends of Sora, or have you kidnapped him?”

“You know Sora?” asked Riku, glancing to the squirrel… who had fallen asleep.

The cat ignored the question. “Hmmmm. Well, if he’s comfortable enough to sleep in your arms, then kidnapping must be out. Unless of course… Stockholm syndrome?”

Riku rolled his eyes. “No one kidnapped him. We’ve been Sora’s friends since we were kids,” he explained

“Since you were kids? But you are still children, are you not? Hmm, maybe not; human ages are strange. But merely friends, you claim? Hmmm… well, if you say so. Now, why is Sora a squirrel?” The cat, head on the right way now, quickly floated over to Sora and bonked him on the head.

Sora blinked open his eyes and looked around. “Huh? What’s going on?” He tilted his head back to look at what was floating above and behind him. “Oh, hello, Cheshire Cat.”

The cat put its paw on Sora’s nose and said, “snick snack snorum.”

Suddenly, Sora became human again, though his face was still in Kairi’s chest—and he he lacked all clothing except for his crown necklace. Sora jumped away, face beet red as he turned on his heel to face away from Riku and Kairi and tried to hide himself with his hands. Riku and Kairi couldn’t help but blush too; Riku tried to stop himself from checking out Sora, he truly did, but it was harder than he expected. He glanced over at Kairi to see that she was having the same issue.

“Oh my,” said the cat with much nonchalance. “Looks like I forgot the clothing. Oh, well. Toodaloo!” The cat swirled its tail around and vanished, his toothy grin fading last.

“Riku! Kairi! What do I do?” Sora whined, almost in a panic. He appeared to be completely sober—most likely because a human body is a few dozen times the size of a squirrel, so now there was too little alcohol in his system to affect him.

Riku looked at his own outfit, which unfortunately only consisted of jeans and a blue v-neck, meaning there was no jacket to lend. Riku’s magical clothing did have a jacket, but neither of them had worn their magical clothing, except for the shoes as they only owned one pair each. Well, except Riku, who owned none now. 

Kairi had an idea though. “Riku! Give him your pants!” she suggested.

“What! But then I’ll be pantless!”

“No, you’ll still have boxers.”

“Oh, right. Uh, guess that works—wait, how do you know I wear boxers?!”

Kairi giggled. “Just give him your pants.”

“Okay, fine,” Riku grumbled, then realized something. “Wait, you have a jacket! Give him that!”

“Oh, right,” Kairi realized, removing her sleeveless hoodie. As she did, an odd spluttering sound came from it; Kairi dropped it in surprise, and out of the hood tumbled the dormouse, who promptly vomited all over the jacket and passed out.

“Yeah, that’s a nope,” Kairi said flatly. She grabbed the hoodie and wrapped it around the mouse a few times, then punted it away, right over the far-off hedge leading to the garden with the tea party. She sighed. “It was brand-new, too… well, Riku, looks like you’re giving him your pants.”

Riku groaned, yet did so, blushing in embarrassment when Kairi and Sora—once in Riku’s pants—both giggled at the pink chocobo design on the boxers.

“Um, either of you have a rope or something?” Sora asked, holding the pants up by the waist. Riku was a few sizes larger than him, and hadn’t worn a belt.

Kairi snickered. “You have wide hips; they’ll stay up.”

“Maybe, but they’ll still be extremely low!”

“You want to borrow my leggings instead?” Kairi suggested, though her tone was teasing. Riku assumed this was because she wasn’t wearing any. “They’re awfully form-fitting, but they do sit higher...”

Sora blushed. “On second thought, the pants work… Wait, you’re wearing leggings!?”

Kairi giggled. “Of course I am, silly.” She hiked her knee-length dress up a bit. Sure enough, there were short black leggings there, coming halfway down her thigh. “You really think I’m going to go adventuring in only a dress and panties? Half my attacks involve some type of jump or flip!” Sora and Riku looked at her in complete surprise, both their mouths agape and blushing slightly. Kairi rolled her eyes. “Seriously, guys?”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Hey, look, clothing trees!” Sora said, darting ahead—only to fall face-first on the ground after tripping over the hem of Riku’s pants for the fifth time in a row.

Riku, feeling slightly sorry for Sora, sighed and swept the brunette up bridal-style. Sora let out a squeak and his face reddened, but he didn’t protest, rather looped his arms around Riku’s neck and hid his blush in Riku’s shoulder. Riku smiled at Sora fondly as he started walking; Sora was always so adorable.

“Hey! You never carry me like that,” Kairi playfully complained.

Sora turned his head to Kairi. “Well, maybe Riku just likes me more,” he said, then stuck out his tongue.

“I like you both equally,” Riku said honestly.

“Then why am I the one you’re carrying?” Sora said. Riku wasn’t sure if the coyness was intentional or not.

“Fine, then,” Riku said with a sly grin, then dropped Sora and scooped up Kairi instead, who squeaked in surprise.

“Riiiikuuuuu!” Sora complained, scrambling up. “Fine, in that case…” he sprung up, latching into Riku’s back like a koala. 

Riku stumbled slightly, but managed to stay upright despite the added weight. “Seriously!?” he said. Thankfully Sora had strong enough legs to hold himself up without support, since Riku’s hands were busy holding Kairi.

“You’re strong enough to carry us both,” Kairi pointed out.

“You’re still heavy when combined,” Riku grumbled, but didn’t otherwise protest.

The group proceeded towards the grove of trees, which indeed had clothing growing on them. Halfway there, Riku had to put down Sora and Kairi. He stretched his back a little, and they continued walking until they were standing in front of a willow tree dotted with various colored polo shirts.

“Um. Can we just take these?” Kairi wondered. No one else seemed to be around.

“Of course you can!” someone said. All three teens jumped and looked around, seeing no one. “Where are you looking? I’m right in front of you!” The three looked forwards, confused, until a wooden face appeared on the tree. “Why, you’re acting like you’ve never seen a talking tree before!” None of the three had, but unanimously and unspokenly decided not to mention that.

“You sure they’re okay to take?” Sora asked.

“Well, it sure looks like you need them,” the tree said, then directed them places by moving its branches. “Around here are the shirt trees. Over to the north are the boxer bushes followed by the dress vines and then the field of skirts; to the west is the panty patch and beyond that is the pants grove, followed by the overall orchard; to the east is the sock shrubs followed by the shoe sequoias. Have fun!” The tree went still, clearly finished conversing.

The trio looked at each other, then proceeded around the clothing farm to get Sora an outfit and Riku some shoes and clean socks. Other than the general classification of plants, each section had a mismatch of species. Some of the plants moved, trying to get them to wear whatever clothing they were growing. One persistent clematis vine managed to get Sora in a pretty blue sundress that matched his eyes; Riku and Kairi suggested he keep it on—the vine had been right about it looking good on him—but Sora adamantly refused. Sora wasn’t the only one who refused outfits, either—the plants seemed to have their own opinions on what should be worn and by whom (they forced Kairi into a checkered skirt with a black blouse and Riku into a red polo shirt, stealing their original clothing in the process). Once Riku had his own pants back and Sora wore a cute outfit consisting of simple black “form-fitting pants” (“Not leggings!” Sora insisted, even though they basically were) and a light-green sleeveless “long shirt” tied at the waist (“Not a dress!” Sora had insisted, even though it had come from the dress vines because the shirt trees refused to give Sora a shirt; if Sora were slightly shorter, it would undoubtedly be a dress), the group reached an impasse.

“How the hell do we get shoes from there?” Riku asked, staring up the tree in front of him. It must have been 200 feet tall and 30 feet in diameter.

A face appeared in this tree, too. It was cat-like, with what appeared to be an egyptian crown carved above it. “Solve my riddle, and I’ll shake some down,” the wooden sphinx said, then said the riddle:  
 _“First think of the person who lives in disguise,  
Who deals in secrets and tells naught but lies.  
Next, tell me what's always the last thing to mend,  
The middle of middle and end of the end?  
And finally give me the sound often heard,  
During the search for a hard-to-find word.  
Now string them together and answer me this,  
Which creature would you be unwilling to kiss?”_

Riku and Kairi looked at each other, then Riku turned to the sphinx-tree to ask, “Could you repeat that?”

“A spider!” Sora declared, clearly not paying attention to the sphinx-tree and instead pointing to a different tree, where a large spider sat staring at them.

“That is correct,” said the sphinx-tree, then shook itself, causing two pairs of shoes to fall on their heads before it vanished. Kairi and Riku looked at each other again, silently agreeing not to look the gift-spider in its mouth, while Sora complained about the tree giving him purple platform shoes whereas Riku got simple black boots.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Hey, Riku, did you see where Sora went?” Kairi asked.

Riku swore, looking around. Sora had run slightly ahead—apparently he had retained either the squirrel’s or the cookie’s hyperactivity—which the two thought would be fine as this dark forest initially had a single path, but they’d emerged onto a crossroads that had at least a dozen paths branching off of it! Or maybe seven or eight? Riku swore that the number kept changing. And there were at least two dozen signs saying things like “this way” and “that way” and “not here” above “yes here”. Why had Sora run off rather than waited for them?

“Need some help?” came a drawling voice from somewhere about Riku. Looking up, he saw the Cheshire cat, who was doing a handstand with its detached head bouncing on its feet. 

“Oh, yes!” Kairi said happily, camera in hand, already with a photo emerging. “Did you see where our friend Sora went?”

“Hmm. Sora, Sora, Sora… I have heard of such a boy before…”

“Well, yes, you saw him earlier today,” Kairi pointed out.

“Did I? Hmmm. Spiky hair, much too hyper, and dangerously curious?”

Riku sighed. “Yeah, sounds like him.”

“Yes, I may have seen him…”

“Okay then, where?” Kairi asked excitedly.

“Hmmm. Here, there…” The cat now stood with his front paws on his detached head as he talked, pointing places with his back legs. “I’m sure you’ll find him. Don’t step on the Mome Raths.”

“The what?” Riku asked, but the cat had vanished.

“Oooh! They’re so cute!” Kairi squealed, pointing to something at their feet. A slew of tiny creatures in every color stared up at them. They had round eyes that took up the entire bottom half of their large round heads, which were fuzzy like pom-poms. Below that, there were long footless legs. That was all they were.

Once the Mome Raths noticed the two looking, they jumped up and then scrambled into an arrow formation and ran off. Riku and Kairi looked at each other, shrugged, and followed after.

Soon the two emerged into another forest, this time one of giant flowers and grasses. The Mome Raths had vanished before they could enter the light; this forest, if it could be called a forest, was much brighter than the one they’d just left, and so abruptly that Riku and Kairi had to blink their eyes a few times to adjust. There was only one path here, which the two followed until they heard a voice in the distance, too far to make out the words but close enough that they could identify to whom it belonged: Sora!

Kairi and Riku ran towards the voice until they came to a small clearing with big mushrooms. Sora sat on one, and on a slightly larger mushroom sat a giant caterpillar smoking something from a hookah-like device, blowing out multicolored clouds in various shapes. Sora laughed as some of them blew over to circle him and popped in his face.

Riku sighed and put a hand on his head. “Great. How much do you want to bet that Sora’s going to be high again?” Riku said to Kairi.

The redhead giggled as they walked over. “Not taking that bet.” She walked ahead of Riku, and upon reaching the mushrooms called, “Hi, Sora! Hello, Mister Caterpillar!”

“Kairi!” Sora cheered. “Come on, get up here!”

Riku sighed. “Kairi…”

“What? I’m not going to let Sora have all the fun this time!” Kairi jumped up onto the mushroom to sit next to Sora.

The caterpillar breathed out a puff of smoke shaped like a car and then stretched out to look at Kairi. “Who,” he said, blowing out the letter ‘O’, which popped in her face, “Are”—an ‘R’—“You?” A ‘U’ blew into Kairi’s face.

“This is my best friend, Kairi!” Sora cheered, throwing his arm over her shoulder, then gestured towards Riku with his other hand. “And that’s my other best friend, Riku!”

Riku sighed and sat down where he was on the ground. He was admittedly somewhat curious about the smoke too, but there needed to be at least one of them sane enough to find their way back to the ship, wherever that was.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Hey, it’s Mister Cat again!” Sora giggled, a goofy grin planted on his face as he waved to the purple cat lying on a low tree branch.

“Hi Mister Cat!” Kairi said, equally as cheerfully.

“As you were told before, I am a Cheshire cat,” the cat said with a roll of his eyes and head. 

“Cheshire Cat,” Riku said, much more composed. “We’re looking to go home, do you—”

“Ah, say no more! I have a shortcut,” the cat said, sitting up and gesturing to the tree trunk with his paw. A hidden door in the tree fell open to reveal a stunningly beautiful forest behind it. Something felt familiar about it, but Riku couldn’t place what.

Riku raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure it’s through there?” It wasn’t any part of Wonderland he had seen or Sora had mentioned before, although neither was the clothing farm.

The cat peered into the tree. “Hmmm. Yes, the way home is surely through there.” The cat curled in on itself and vanished.

Seeing as Sora and Kairi had already run through the door, Riku decided he should follow. Once on the other side, he looked back to find no door—not even a solid surface for there to be a door on. The forest thankfully seemed completely normal; no talking trees, no singing animals, just a normal forest, albeit an extremely beautiful one. The sun shined high in the skin and the trees swayed vibrantly, causing the ground to seem to sparkle with light. The three walked around, searching for a path or any hint of not-forest, until they saw a figure walking towards them.

“Oh, I thought I sensed someone in here!” Merlin, now human too, said jovially as he met them halfway. “Sora, glad to see you’re back to being human.”

“You too!” Sora said happily. “You remembered the spell?”

Merlin chuckled. “Oh no. It’s different when changing back to yourself versus a different person!”

Riku looked at Merlin in slight confusion. “Wait. You’re visiting Wonderland, too?”

Merlin laughed. “Oh, so that’s where you came from! You must have stepped through a one-way portal. Those lead here sometimes.”

“A what? Wait, where are we?”

“Why, my forest, of course! Floor 23 of the house!”

“What! We were just trying to get back to the GummiShip! How…? Ugh, that stupid cat...”

“Well, you did tell him that we wanted to go home,” Sora pointed out. “And we are technically home.”

Riku sighed. “I don’t suppose you could send us back there, huh?”

“Nope!” Merlin said, just as chipperly. “That’s why they’re called one-way portals!”

Sora and Kairi decided to each hold Riku’s hand—the same hand—as Merlin led them out of the forest, the two skipping, giggling, and tripping over each other the entire way.

They exited through a wooden free-standing door, and sure enough, they were in the house. Merlin went upstairs, and Riku carefully helped Sora and Kairi down the stairs. They’d need to borrow a ship to go retrieve theirs…

“What’s up with them?” Cid, sitting at the first-floor computer, asked Riku as the group exited the staircase. “And why is Sora in a dress?” Yuffie and Leon were there, too; Sora immediately tackled the latter into a hug, and the man glared at Riku, expression demanding an explanation.

“We were in Wonderland, and some giant caterpillar got them high with who-knows-what,” Riku explained. “Sora’s in a dress because a talking cat undid the squirrel spell but forgot to give him clothing, and the plants on a farm that grew clothing insisted Sora wear that. It’s stranger than it sounds.”

Leon raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you mean, ‘not as strange’?”

“No, I do mean stranger… Anyway, we got back here because the cat sent us through a one-way portal that exited into Merlin’s forest. So, Cid, can the three of us borrow a ship? Ours is still in Wonderland, and the portal apparently is one-way, so we need to retrieve it.”

Cid pursed his lips. “The three of you?” He looked at Kairi and Sora pointedly, who were wrestling on the aquamarine cough, giggling and fighting over a large bone. Why they had a large bone was anyone’s guess. The female squirrel, who apparently had decided to stay, seemed to be pondering that too as she perched on the arm of the couch watching them.

“I see your point,” Riku conceded.

“I’ll join you!” Yuffie volunteered.

Cid scoffed. “No offense, but I don’t trust you driving either.”

Leon sighed. “I’ll go. Yuffie, you make sure Sora and Kairi don’t get into trouble before they come down, okay?” A beat. “Or after.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Another intermission in Radiant Garden, where they learn magic with Merlin and Kairi and Riku have a chat.


	5. Merlin's Training

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Merlin changes Riku into a bird, Sora becomes Merlin's full-time apprentice, and Kairi and Riku have a heart-to-heart while watching Sora practice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is probably the shortest of the chapters, but I'm trying to keep chapters divided by location rather than length.

“My boy, how do you feel about flying?” Merlin asked Riku upon pulling him away from restoration work one morning—he trained everyone in magic and other special abilities at random times.

“Well, it’s pretty fun, I suppose.”

“Oh! So you’ve done it before, then?”

“Yeah, in Neverland, using some—”

“Pixie dust,” Merlin finished, scoffing. “That’s just a parlour trick, not true flying. No, I’m talking about on your own! With wings! Ever flown that way?”

Riku looked at Merlin in surprise. “I don’t have wings, so no, can’t say I’ve flown with them before.” Shouldn’t that be obvious? Riku suddenly became highly conscious of the location of today’s training—the roof of the highest tower of the castle that looked over Radiant Garden; Riku currently leaned against the parapet.

“Well, then, let’s fix that!” Merlin said cheerfully. “Prestidigitonium!”

Riku blinked, looking at Merlin, who seemed to have grown twenty times his size. No, wait—Riku had shrunk. Riku looked around; he stood on the parapet on spindly pale-orange legs ending in tiny talons. He opened his wings carefully; brown and grey black-tipped feathers. He clicked his beak. Yup, he was a bird, a sparrow from the looks of it. “I’m… a bird,” Riku said emotionlessly.

“My oh my!” Merlin proclaimed. “Why, you’re the first person to not be overjoyed by that!”

“Yeah, well, considering how the squirrel thing with Sora went…”

“Yes, that went very well, if I do say! Well, except that ending bit, but that was fine, he changed back eventually.”

“But now you remember the spell?” Riku asked hopefully.

Merlin thought for a moment, then said, “Oh, bollocks. Well, it’s the same as the squirrel one… I’m sure I’ll remember it.”

Riku’s heart missed a beat. “Wait, you forgot it again?!”

“What? Oh, no, I never found Archimedes to ask.”

Riku put his wing on his forehead. Great, just great… wait, he had heard the cat say the spell to change Sora back, didn’t he? What was it now… Ugh! Riku couldn’t remember either! Hopefully Kairi or Sora would.

Merlin grabbed Riku, who chirped loudly in surprise. “Now, ready to fly?” the wizard said.

“No! No, of course not! I don’t know how to!”

“Well, the best way to learn it is to do it, isn’t it? You’re a bird! It’ll come naturally!”

Merlin tossed Riku up and off of the tower.

Riku froze as he arched through the air, feeling momentarily weightless as his body shifted from being thrown upwards to falling downwards. This was it; this is how things were going to end, as him in the form of a bird pathetically splattering onto the ground because he couldn’t fly. 

“Fly, Riku, fly!” Merlin called.

Riku snapped back to himself. He couldn’t die like this! He began vigorously flapping his wings; he hovered in their air momentarily and then careened into the side of the castle. He was momentarily stunned, falling upside down. He twisted in the air and put out his wings, eventually righting himself. He was feet away from the ground when a current of air suddenly rose up below him—he suspected Merlin must have used an aero spell. Riku held out his wings and the artificial breeze lifted him up over the nearby rooftops.

Riku felt a brief surge of euphoria amongst the panic; he was actually getting a hang on this flying thing! Well, possibly. Enough to keep himself in the air, at least, or so he hoped. It seemed that flapping wasn’t very necessary once you got into the air, although he still didn’t know how to navigate at all.

Riku began losing height, which changed all the budding euphoria back to sheer panic. He was about to crash into a roof! Riku quickly flapped his wings and tried turning, which he barely managed. Okay, he had to slow down, now, land somewhere… but how did he do that?! He tilted his wings, hoping that would help… nope, that sped him up! He tried again, only to again move even faster, now street-level and barely managing to dodge screaming people and buildings.

After a few minutes of this, Riku noticed Kairi heading home from the castle for lunch, and tried his best to navigate towards her. Her eyes widened as she noticed the living projectile heading towards her, but thankfully didn’t try to dodge. Riku barrelled into Kairi; miraculously, she managed to catch him in her arms.

Riku cuddled up to Kairi’s chest, heart racing. Somehow he had managed to survive. 

“Hello, Riku!” Kairi said, instantly recognizing him despite the avian body. “Merlin’s training, huh?”

Riku nodded, unable to speak.

“Let me guess, he threw you off a tower?”

Riku nodded again, then found his voice. “Yeah. Did he do that to you too?”

Kairi shook her head. “Not exactly. He turned me into a fish and tossed me into a lake.”

Riku chuckled slightly in disbelief, though it came out as a few chirps. “Someone really needs to teach that wizard proper training techniques.”

Kairi shrugged. “It worked though, didn’t it?” Her camera was out again, facing towards them. Riku had learned by now to not complain about her taking photos.

“Worked? What worked? He didn’t even say what he was teaching!”

Kairi looked at Riku in slight confusion. “Isn’t it obvious? He wanted to get us out of our comfort zones, learn to adapt to the situation and use instincts without panicking.”

Riku thought about that momentarily. It kinda made sense, maybe. “I guess I failed then,” Riku concluded. “I just flew around in a panic until I found you.”

“But you flew.”

Riku had to concede that point; regardless of how erratic and traumatizing it had been, he still had flown.

Riku heard footsteps running towards them. Kairi didn’t react, so it must be someone they knew. “Hey, Kairi, have you seen Riku?” Sora asked. Riku chirped in excitement.

Kairi giggled. “Right here,” she said, loosening her grip on Riku to turn him to face Sora.

Sora chucked. “Let me guess, Merlin?”

“Yup,” Riku confirmed.

“Hmm. That must be pretty neat,” Sora concluded. “A bird seems much more fun than a squirrel…”

“No,” Riku said petulantly. “Not fun at all. Completely terrifying—he threw me off a castle tower! The highest one! Also, he forgot the spell to change back, AGAIN. Well, technically not again; he never remembered it in the first place!”

Sora grinned. “It’s okay! I remember it!” Sora placed his hand on Riku’s head. “Snick snack snorum!”

Riku changed back to himself, thankfully clothed—he had remembered to wear his magical clothing when training with Merlin, just in case something like this happened. He was pretty sure that in Wonderland it had just been the cat’s trick that caused Sora to lose his, but Riku preferred to err on the safe side.

Kairi released Riku from her arms, then turned to Sora looking excited. “You did the spell! That’s amazing! How did you do that? I thought only Merlin could!”

Sora shrugged, blushing slightly. “I dunno. I just did what the cat did.”

Riku smiled too and ruffled Sora’s hair. “It’s still pretty amazing. You’re a whole lot better at magic than either of us. Better than most mages I know, come to think of it.”

Sora blinked in surprise. “What? No I’m not. My magic sucks.”

Riku blinked in surprise. Was Sora being serious? “Why would you think that?” Riku questioned.

“Well that’s what Donald says. He’s always saying my magic needs work.”

Kairi raised an eyebrow. “Seriously? You used a meteor spell a few weeks ago.”

“Yeah but I destroyed the wall and nearly passed out,” Sora continued to argue.

“You still pulled it off though.”

“Yeah,” Riku agreed. “I bet Merlin would be more than willing to train you in some much more advanced magic than that, even the transformation things.”

Sora frowned. “But Donald—”

“Screw Donald,” Riku said at the same time Kairi said “Fuck him”.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Merlin was more than happy to teach Sora advanced magic upon learning he’d succeeded in doing a reverse transformation spell, going as far as to declare him his official apprentice and insisting he spend the whole day training every day, no more reconstruction work or physical keyblade training. After some debate, and Riku and Kairi insisting they needed Sora’s help specifically when training, it was negotiated that morning would be for magic while afternoons would alternate between magic and physical skills.

Today was one of the days Sora was off doing magic in the afternoon while Kairi and Riku practiced keyblade skills in Merlin’s forest. Riku currently was attempting to teach Kairi how to use a reprisal attack called sliding crescent, with ‘attempting’ being the keyword.

“Argh! I just can’t get it!” Kairi yelled, throwing her keyblade onto the ground, only for it to reappear in her hand. So she threw it down again; it got the idea and stayed down.

“Hey, relax,” Riku said. “Maybe this attack just isn’t for you.”

Kairi glared at him. “Oh, so you’re saying I can’t? That I’m not good enough? Sorry I can’t catch onto things as quickly as you and Sora!”

Riku waved his arms in front of him. “No no no, not what I meant at all!”

“Yeah? Then what did you mean?” Kairi shouted. Riku tried to stay calm; Kairi was just taking out her frustration on him, not angry at Riku himself.

“I just meant that maybe Sora’s version of it would be a better fit,” Riku explained calmly. “He can’t do this one either.”

“He can’t?” Kairi asked, surprised.

Riku smiled, glad she seemed calmer. “Nope. And I can’t do the version he does. See if he’ll teach you it tomorrow; it’s called ‘sliding sidewinder’.”

Kairi sighed, dismissing her keyblade, which had still been on the ground. “Okay, I’ll ask him. Hey, let’s get ice cream.”

Riku chuckled. “Kairi, we’ve been practicing for less than an hour.”

“I know, but I think I need some time to cool down, otherwise I’ll literally cut someone’s head off.”

Riku blinked at her in surprise. Kairi seemed rather high-strung compared to usual. “Okay, let’s get ice cream then,” he decided, following Kairi, who already had her hand on the forest’s door.

The two made their way through the house and down the street to the market, where they purchased some ice cream. Riku chose a simple chocolate-vanilla swirl cone, whereas Kairi went fancy with a toasted-almond popsicle.

The two walked around town, automatically heading to a secluded spot overlooking the Great Maw. The two of them and Sora had discovered it, and claimed it as their ice-cream-eating spot. Sora said he enjoyed eating ice cream on high-up places where he could dangle his feet, although he didn’t know why. Riku figured it must be related to Roxas, who had sat on Twilight Town’s clock tower eating ice cream with his friends after each mission. Sora was probably feeling nostalgia from those memories, even if he didn’t actually remember them himself.

“Hey, look, Sora’s down there!” Kairi said, pointing as she settled on the edge of the cliff. “Looks like Merlin’s trying to teach him some grand magic.”

Riku looked where Kairi was pointing, although the pointing was unnecessary. Sora couldn’t be more obvious as he tried using the magic that Merlin was teaching him, as the magic was huge—no wonder the chasm was where Merlin wanted Sora to practice it! 

Huge blasts of water and wind were being flung around; was he trying some sort of combination spell? Sora stopped and slumped a little. He said something to Merlin, who merely chuckled and replied; Riku figured that Sora, much like Kairi had shortly before, become frustrated about not succeeding at something. Yet whatever Merlin said to him must have worked, as Sora took a deep breath and his stance changed to one of determination. He stuck his tongue out in an adorable display of concentration, took a casting stance, and a couple seconds later released both a water spell and aero spell at once, swirling them together to create a mist, although from his reaction it seemed to only be half the effect desired; Merlin encouraged him to keep trying.

“What do you think he’s trying to learn?” Kairi wondered.

Riku shook his head. “No clue. Maybe something with three types of magic? The fog is two, but he doesn’t seem as excited as he’d be if he’d gotten what he was aiming for.”

Kairi nodded. “Merlin tried to teach me fog before, too; it’s water and air. I completely failed though. But Sora can get two-type spells with ease, so yeah, I’d guess he's probably trying to add a third, or maybe combine them in a different way… is that even possible though?”

“Is what possible?” Riku asked.

“Combining spells in different ways. For example, meteor is earth, fire, and gravity, right? Does that combo always make meteor, or are there other ways? Like, if you do a regular fire instead of firaga, or something.”

Riku shrugged. “You’ll have to ask Merlin that.”

Kairi gave a frustrated sigh. “If I ever get a chance. I think he’s given up on me.”

“Why’s that?”

“He hasn’t invited me to train in a while, although he has with you. I rarely get the spells he wants me to. All I can ever do is the basics, with the exception of water magic.”

“Well, that’s typical,” Riku said in an attempt to comfort her. “Most mages, if they ever manage higher magic, which is actually pretty rare, only end up mastering one or two high-level spells. So you're on par with most mages.”

Kairi crossed her arms and pouted. “I know. I don’t want to be on par with them; I want to be at the level of you two! Well, at least you.”

Riku smiled gently. “And I’m sure you will be. But remember, I’ve had two years to practice magic, whereas you learned your first spell just a few months ago. It’ll take time.”

Kairi sighed. “Yeah. Sorry, I’m just a bit high-strung today.”

Riku laughed. “Yeah, I’ve noticed.”

“Hey!” Kairi playfully shoved Riku, though not enough to off-balance him.

Riku frowned. “What’s up with that, anyway? Something on your mind? Other than the magic, I mean. It’s not like you to get so easily frustrated.”

Kairi blushed. “Er. Don’t worry about it. I just… I get like this sometimes.”

Riku tilted his head in curiosity. “Really? I never noticed before.”

Kairi rolled her eyes. “Yeah, well, the Islands have pain medicine, here doesn’t.”

Riku was shocked at this information. Well, not the medicine, he knew that, but, “You’re in pain? Why? How?”

Kairi looked at Riku in slight amusement. “Come on, thought you were smarter than that.” When Riku looked at her in confusion, Kairi sighed, and gave a more obvious hint. “Happens once a month.”

Riku furrowed his brow, trying to figure it out. “Once a month… oh,” he said, realizing with a reddening face. “Right. Got it…” Riku then had an idea. “Did you try asking the girls what they do? Or if that’s too embarrassing, maybe one of the libraries has information? I bet there’s some sort of general magic to dull chronic pain, or a potion or something. Merlin might know. I can ask him for you if you want.”

Kairi’s face looked like a beet. “M-maybe. Um…” she abruptly changed the subject. “Hey, look, Sora seems to be getting the hang of things! I think.” 

Riku looked towards Sora, who seemed excited. He did the spell again, this time instantly creating the fog, which rose off the ground slightly—then burst into an explosion of water. Kairi had her camera out to document it.

“Maybe he’s trying to shape it,” Riku suggested.

“Maybe… oh!” Kairi’s eyes lit up. “Riku, I have an idea!”

“Hmm?”

“Well, earlier we were wondering if magic could combine differently… I wonder if that applies to abilities?”

Riku looked at Kairi in confusion. “Abilities? Kairi, abilities don’t combine.”

“Well, yeah. I mean the magic-infused ones! And not really combine differently, more like, use different magic. Like, you have things like ‘dark roll’. Obviously I can’t do dark magic, but I wonder…”

“If you can use light for it instead?” Riku completed the thought. “Hmm. Yeah, I suppose it’s possible. Worth a try, anyway!”

“Yeah!” Kairi jumped up, eyes sparkling with excitement. “Come on, let’s get back to training!”

Riku smiled as he stood up too. They walked over to a trash can to throw the popsicle sticks and wrappers out, when Riku noticed something. “Wait, Kairi, don’t throw that out!”

Kairi raised an eyebrow at Riku, although she didn’t release the stick into the garbage.

“Look,” Riku told her, taking her stick and showing her the writing on it.

The words on the popsicle stick read “WINNER”.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Riku! Kairi! Look what I can do!” Sora shouted excitedly as he ran into the house, Merlin following. Sora held his hands up and out as he concentrated, gathering magical energy in his hands. “Cloud!” he finally yelled. The energy scattered outwards and a small cloud formed along the ceiling. 

Merlin chuckled. “Very good!” he turned to the other two, looking proud. “A cloud combines three types of magic: aero and water to make the cloud, and zero-gavity to raise it up. The stronger the zero-gravity spell, the higher the cloud will rise, unless it has something blocking it like a ceiling. Without that, it simply ends up being fog—which of course is useful itself, but the purpose of this is to practice combining three types of magic, not two.”

“That’s amazing,” Kairi said in wonder, and Riku agreed. The two were resting on the currently-lilac couch, having just gotten inside themselves not even five minutes prior. That spell must be what Sora had been working on earlier that day, when Riku and Kairi had been watching him practice.

“Oh, wait, Sora, hold up a minute, that’s a bit too much water magic,” Merlin warned as the cloud darkened. “If it gets any more, it’ll—ah, there it is.”

Just as Cid arrived downstairs, the cloud broke, causing a surprisingly heavy rain to fall. Thankfully it avoided Kairi and Riku, and Merlin and Sora seemed to be immune, but Cid got the full brunt of it.

“Oops,” Sora said sheepishly.

“Merlin!” Cid yelled. “What have I told you about using non-household magic in the house!?”

“Oh, that wasn’t me,” Merlin said in his usual pleasant manner. He turned to Sora. “Sora, my boy, maybe weather magic shouldn’t be used in the house, hmm? Not until you get a little better at it.”

“Or not at all!” Cid grumbled, looking like he’d just taken a swim. “And can you stop this blasted rain?!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: The trio tests their skills at Olympus Coliseum, and come to some realizations about themselves.


	6. Olympus Coliseum (part 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The trio compete in a huge four-day tournament at the rebuilt Olympus Coliseum to test their strength, but may be in for more than they bargained for once they realize that most the entrants are gods and similar beings! Goofy's son also participates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I initially wanted each world to be one chapter, but then realized that would make Olympus Coliseum 13k words (I promise it is not all fighting! Lots of fluff and stuff mixed in.) This first chapter has the bulk of it with nearly 7.5k words, with the second having about 6.5k.

“Riku! Kairi! Let’s go to the coliseum!” Sora proclaimed at breakfast one morning.

“The coliseum?” Riku asked. “Why?”

“Because then we can see if we’ve gotten stronger,” Sora explained matter-of-factly, as he fed the little female squirrel sitting on his shoulder some bacon. Riku wasn’t entirely sure if squirrels normally ate bacon, but the squirrel—whom Kairi had named ‘Rose’ after vetoing Sora’s suggestion of ‘Fluffy’—seemed to love it regardless. She’d decided to move in after Merlin forgot to send her back to her own place/time.

“If? You definitely have,” Leon said. He and Cloud were sitting with the three around the coffee table on the ground floor room eating breakfast.

“Yeah, well, competing will prove it,” Sora said, clearly intent on going. “Oh! You and Cloud can come too!” he suggested to Leon.

“No,” Cloud immediately said adamantly, showing more emotion than usual. “I’m not going back there.”

“What? Why—oh, right. Bad memories.”

Cloud nodded in response to Sora.

“I’m not going to go either,” Leon said. “There’s too much for me to work on here. But you three should definitely go—Sora’s right, it would be a good way to test your strength. Especially you, Sora—I’ve seen some of that magic Merlin’s been teaching you the past couple weeks.”

Sora blushed. “Aww, it’s not that impressive.”

Riku scoffed. “Understatement of the year. Leon’s right, let’s see it in action!” It’d be a great self-esteem boost for Sora, too, to see just how far he’d come magic-wise in just a short time. Sora had only been doing full-time magic training with Merlin for a fortnight—once the wizard learned Sora had managed a reverse transformation spell he’d decided to make him his full-time apprentice, which allegedly the wizard had been considering anyway since Sora learned the meteor spell—yet he had learned more from Merlin than Donald ever taught him. Donald had been dead wrong about Sora’s magical ability; somehow, Sora still didn’t believe that, but a legitimate competition with Sora as their mage definitely would prove to him otherwise.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Whoa, so this is the coliseum!” Kairi proclaimed in wonder, staring up at the stone building surrounded by columns covered in intricately carved designs with marble statues of warriors in various types of armor and weapons in between them.

“Wow. They really fixed it up nicely,” Sora commented. “It was destroyed last time I was here,” Sora explained upon seeing Kairi’s puzzled stare. 

“Wait, but didn’t you say you fought in a tournament last time you were here?” Riku asked, confused. If it were destroyed…

“Oh, no, that was in the Underworld’s coliseum,” Sora explained. “This one’s better.”

“Better, huh? Well, excuse me, but I beg to differ,” came a voice from behind the trio. They all swerved around to find…

“Hades,” Riku said blankly. “What do you want?” he asked the blue-fire-haired God of the Underworld.

“Ouch, not a very warm welcome there. Think after all I’d done for you, you’d show a little more gratefulness.”

“Huh?” Riku asked, confused. “What the hell have you ever done for me?” He’d met the guy just a couple of times, when he’d been working for… well, he’d rather forget that time. Point was, he’d spoken to the guy maybe thrice, if that.

“Pfft. I wasn’t talking to you.” Hades said with a roll of his eyes. “I was talking to the little twink. Quite an icy glare, hmm? And after all the help I gave you.”

Sora responded with angry confusion. “Help? What the fuck? You—”

Hades waved a hand in dismissal. “Oh, right, that. Hey, water under the bridge, right?” He slid over to Sora and put an arm around his shoulder; Sora glared at him. Kairi and Riku growled slightly as they drew their keyblades, preparing to attack if necessary. Hades ignored them. “So, let’s say we make a little deal, huh?”

Sora shoved the god away. “No. You won’t trick me again.”

Riku watched the display with concerned confusion. Sora hadn’t told them he’d had dealings with Hades. How had Sora been tricked?

Hades rolled his eyes. “Tricked is hardly the word. Okay, maybe it is. But it all worked out! Unlocking the Underdrome was a good thing; it gave people a place to compete while this one was destroyed!”

“After you destroyed it,” Sora pointed out.

“Eh, details. You competed too, though, so don’t say you didn’t benefit from opening it back up!”

“Okay, fine, I guess that’s technically true, but you used that to hurt my friends! You sent Pete to ambush us after we had no choice but to open it to save Meg, which you used to distract us while you tried to kill Hercules and destroy the coliseum!” Sora said. Riku was relieved; so it hadn’t been a conscious deal with Hades, as Riku had been worried about.

Hades shrugged. “Hey, technically the Hydra did the last bit.”

“You sent it there,” Sora pointed out.

“Look, I only told it where to go, kid. What it did after that is not on me. Now, do you mind telling your little puppies to heel?”

“My what?” Sora asked in confusion, as Hades gestured to Riku and Kairi, who still had their keyblades out. Riku had to hold himself back from striking Hades just over that.

“Hades! What are you doing here?” came a voice; Riku looked to see an extremely buff guy wearing sleeveless golden greek armor.

“Ugh. Hercules,” Hades said, face contorted into a clear look of disgust.

“You don’t belong up here. Go back to your Underworld.”

Hades scoffed. “Yeah? Or else what, you gonna tattle to daddy?”

Hercules crossed his arms and glared at Hades.

The god rolled his eyes again. “Yeah yeah, whatever. It was getting boring here anyway.” He swirled around and vanished in a cloud of dark mist. Riku and Kairi dismissed their keyblades.

“Hercules!” Sora cheered. “These are the friends I was telling you about!”

“Oh? Hmm. Kairi and Riku, right?” Hercules greeted. “I’ve heard—”

“So much about us, we know,” Riku interrupted, laughing. “Apparently Sora talks about us to everyone he meets.”

Sora blushed. “No I don’t!” he protested, to which everyone else responded with laughs.

Hercules smiled fondly. “I see. Well, I’m glad Sora finally found you,” he said to Riku, just like everyone they met had.

“Herc is the one I helped out when here!” Sora said proudly. Riku and Kairi both knew that story well; Sora loved telling them about how he became an official hero.

Hercules smiled. “And I couldn’t have asked for better help. So, what brings you here? Watching or participating?”

“Participating, of course!” Sora told Hercules. “We want to see how much stronger we’ve gotten! I’ve been studying advanced magic.” Sora put his hands on his hips and puffed his chest out in a show of pride.

“Wow, that’s impressive! I have no doubt you’ve grown stronger,” Hercules said, and it sounded earnest.

“Hmph. I’ll be the judge of that.” A short orange satyr with a large belly stomped up to the group. “The gods may have declared you a ‘true hero’ like Herc, and you may have fought in the Underdrome, but this here’s where the real competition is at!”

Sora looked confused. “But wasn’t the reason Zeus sealed the Underdrome in the first place because it was too tough compared to here?”

“No, it was locked because of the degree of violence it embraced, not difficulty! Our tournaments frown on death, not encourage it, unlike them.”

“But isn’t that the same thing? It’s definitely more intense if you know you might die.”

The satyr threw his hands up. “Oy vey! Why in Tartarus the gods decided to make you a hero, I have no idea!” He began to walk away, then turned when he saw they weren’t following him. “Well, do you want to compete or not? Herc—and somehow Sora—are fine, but I have yet to judge if you other two wimps are worthy of entering the tournament!”

“Aww, come on, seriously?” Sora asked. “They’re my friends! I can vouch for them!”

“Hmph. That’s what they all say. You know what, you get over here, too, gotta make sure you didn’t lose your stuff.”

“What! I got even more powerful, I’ll have you know!”

“Yeah? Prove it.”

“Okay, fine! Mete—”

“No!” Kairi and Riku proclaimed, tackling Sora to the ground before he could finish the spell.

“Aww, come on, guys, I’ve been practicing!” Sora whined.

“Yeah, and you took out a building!” Kairi pointed out. “You’re lucky that house was abandoned!”

“Yeah, didn’t you just say the coliseum was recently rebuilt?” Riku said, standing up and helping the other two up too.

The satyr narrowed his eyes and put his fists on his hips. “If you destroy the coliseum, your hero status is being revoked.”

Sora raised an eyebrow, putting his fists on his hips too. “Can you even do that?”

Hercules laughed. “No, he can’t. The gods decide the heroes; Phil just trains them.” Ah, so that’s what the satyr’s name was—he hadn’t actually introduced himself to Riku and Kairi.

The satyr realized this too. “Oh, by the way, I’m Philoctetes, but you can call me Phil,” he said to Riku and Kairi. “I’m an official trainer of heroes! Well, mostly junior heroes. Very few actually make hero. I trained four though! Not many can say that; you’re lucky if you get one. Mine were Hercules, of course, then Sora, the duck, and the dog.” 

“Um. You didn’t exactly do that much,” Sora pointed out. 

“What do you mean? I taught you all the ropes!”

“Not really. Hades probably contributed more than you did.”

The satyr nearly turned completely red in anger. “Why, you! I have half a mind to revoke your hero status for that!”

Hercules sighed. “Again, Phil, you can’t do that. Come on you two, can’t you ever get along?”

The satyr turned away. “Hmph. Call yourself lucky, kid, that Herc vouched for you. Now, let’s get you THREE in shape.”

Riku, Sora, and Kairi tried not to laugh as they followed Phil into the coliseum while Hercules left to go do something else. It was probably best not to anger the satyr any more, particularly with the muscular hero not there to calm him.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Ugh!” Sora moaned, collapsing on one of the surprisingly comfortable leather couches in the competitor waiting area of the coliseum. “I never want to see another barrel again.”

“How do they even get so many for people to beat up?” Kairi wondered, sitting next to Sora.

“I dunno. Regardless, you two are able to compete now.”

“Hmm.” Riku mused. He suspected Phil would have let them fight regardless, being with Sora. The competition was in teams of up to three, after all. Plus Riku suspected Phil didn’t actually have the authority to suppress entrants. Riku looked down at the form Phil had given him. “So, the form wants us to have a team name,” he told the others. “Any ideas?”

Sora perked up at that. “How about something having to do with our keyblades? Umm. Like, ‘The Conquerors of Darkness’ or something.”

“But Riku uses darkness,” Kairi pointed out. “And technically you do too—didn’t Merlin teach you some sort of dark mist thing?” 

Sora laughed. “You mean ‘blackout’? Nah, that’s just an illusion thing that inflicts the ‘blindness’ status, not actual darkness. But that is a good point about Riku. So maybe ‘Kings of Darkness’?”

“That’s the opposite direction! Besides, I’d be a Queen.”

“Okay. ‘Queens of Darkness’ it is then.”

Riku watched the whole display in amusement. “Maybe we can go halfway then. Something with ‘twilight’ in the name.”

Sora perked up, then said in a near-total non-sequitur, “Oh! Can we go to Twilight Town later? I want sea-salt ice cream!”

“‘Sea-Salt’ is a cool name,” Kairi suggested. “It is good ice cream after all.”

Riku was suddenly made acutely aware that within those two resided Namine and Roxas, who had been huge fans of sea-salt ice cream. Yet Riku had to admit that he too had grown fond of the ice cream after spending a year eating it nearly daily—Ansem the Wise and Namine had always made sure to have the freezer stocked with it. “Sea-Salt it is,” Riku concluded, writing it on the form.

“Sweet!” said Kairi. “So, the tournament starts tomorrow, right? What should we do the rest of today? I don’t really fancy doing more barrel-training.”

Riku nodded. “Yeah, same. We do have to find somewhere to spend the night though—it is getting late after all, and no way are we spending it on the ship the entire week.” The tournament had been restructured since the coliseum had been rebuilt; although there were still smaller two-day ones twice a week most weeks (as opposed to single-day ones as before; the new structure had day one being heartless with day two being the ones who got through those rounds), they had also decided to hold larger multi-day tournaments every few months, spread out over four days and consisting entirely of non-heartless beings. Apparently people had come from all over to compete specifically for this first one. The trio had arrived just in time for it. Instead of straight fighting for an entire day it was treated more like a festival, with fights beginning at noon, a break for some sort of entertainment in-between, then some more rounds before carnival-like evening festivities. They’d need to go find an inn in town to stay in.

“We better do that soon then,” Kairi pointed out. “People will probably be arriving to watch, looking for rooms too.”

Phil overheard as he entered the lobby. “Oh, don’t worry about that,” he told them. “The coliseum has a second floor with rooms for competitors now, since we’re doing the whole overnight thing and it’s become more popular. Inns need room for spectators, after all. Each team gets its own room—sorry, no separate ones for different genders. That’s not a problem, is it?” The three shook their heads. “Good. Now, got your form finished?” Riku handed Phil the form. “Great. Now, here’s a room key,”—he tossed them a key—“stairs are over there, I’ve got stuff to do, see ya.” The satyr walked out of the room again.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

The following morning, Riku sat on the edge of the unoccupied bed of the two in the room (teams of three, so all the rooms had two beds, of course; but that was fine seeing as Sora always ended up in one of their beds each night anyway) holding a tightly-wound scroll. “Okay, let’s go over the rules before our fights this afternoon…”

“Pfft,” Sora said, rolling over in bed, slinging an arm over Kairi. “I’ve fought here before, no need to know the rules.”

“I agree,” Kairi said sleepily, now trapped under Sora but making no move to get up either way. “Riku, get more sleep, it’s too early.”

“It’s 9am. We only have four hours before the opening ceremony, and competitors need to be there a half hour early.”

“Exactly,” Sora mumbled. “Plenty of time to sleep.”

Riku sighed and put his head in his hand. “No, it’s not. We need to eat breakfast, review the rules, make sure our gear fits”—to keep things fair, each team now received uniforms that could hold just a limited amount of items and matched their team members for easy identification—“get some practice in—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Sora said, waving a hand in dismissal.

“You also really need to review the rules, Sora. The tournament is structured completely differently now.” The structure itself was simple enough: tiered, and with a total of 64 teams (how did they get that many?) it worked out to be six rounds. Round one was spread between the first two days, with the opening ceremony and then twelve matches on day one and twenty matches on day two (so they would fight once on only one of the days), second and third on day three for a total twenty matches again (so potentially two fights), and the fourth day having the quarter-, semi-, and finals, ending earlier than the other two days with only seven matches (potentially fighting thrice) to make time for closing ceremonies and a celebration. Plus, the rules had actually changed a lot as the competitors were all actual living beings as opposed to heartless (they’d probably mostly be human, but you never knew; Hades sometimes slipped his dog or random monsters into these things—which thankfully wouldn’t be on a team if they were, as there was a total team weight restriction too, the exception to that limit being if it was a single entrant). Yes, Sora needed to review things, no matter how much he protested. “Come on, up,” Riku prodded.

But Sora stayed buried in the bed, apparently now ignoring Riku.

Riku paused, then jumped up. “If you don’t get up now, I’m going to tickle both of you.”

In response, Sora grabbed the covers and pulled it over both of them while Kairi giggled.

Riku grinned. “Alright then…” He hopped over to the bed, tore the covers off, jumped onto it, and began tickling the two, producing squeals from them both.

“Okay, okay, we’re up, we’re up!” Kairi said through laughter. Riku stopped, and Kairi and Sora both climbed out of the bed.

As the two yawned and stretched, Riku grabbed a couple of the uniforms and tossed them at the two. They were simple brown shorts and short-sleeve shirts, flexible and tight to allow for maximum movement and no snagging. There seemed to be a magical component that adjusted them to fit properly. Each had a single magical pocket that could hold four items of their choice. The shirts were black with two stripes circling around it, one bright blue and the other emerald green, with a white number 57 on the back.

“These colors clash horribly,” Kairi said with a look of disgust.

“Yeah; this shade of brown with black? Come on.” Apparently Sora had actually listened to Kairi’s fashion lectures, to Riku’s surprise. Riku sure hadn’t.

“I think the shorts are standard for everyone, and the colors and numbers match the team,” Riku pointed out, hoping that would quell their complaints. “I saw some in other colors too when I picked them up.”

“Then why didn’t you grab something better?” Kairi asked.

“Well, they didn’t really give me a choice,” Riku retorted. “Besides, this looks pretty cool, right?”

Sora scrunched up his nose. “Maybe the shirt, but definitely not those pants.”

Riku rolled his eyes. “Fine, whatever. But everyone’s going to be wearing the same ones and they’ll all be fighting anyway. Doubt anyone will notice nor care.”

Sora pouted and crossed his arms. “You don’t know that.” 

Kairi mimicked Sora’s pose. “Yeah, for all we know Aphrodite could be watching!”

Riku sighed. “Okay, fine, you two win. They look horrible. We have to wear them anyway though, so deal. Now get changed; we’ll go over the rules during—hey, have some modesty!”

Kairi shrugged. “You two saw me in bikinis all the time back on the Islands. How’s this any different?”

Riku and Sora both turned away, blushing; clearly Kairi hadn’t realized that the last time they’d gone swimming together had been before the Islandsfell. Two years had changed a lot of things; this would have been fine as kids, but they were older teens now! New feelings had developed, seemingly on all three of their parts (which would be a mess to eventually untangle).

“Well? Aren’t you two changing, too?” Kairi asked, and the two boys turned to find she’d finished dressing—the uniform looked very flattering on her, Riku thought, even if allegedly it didn’t match. Riku and Sora glanced at each other, silently asking if they should request Kairi to leave or not, then decided against it. Kairi seemed unperturbed by it, after all, and it’d save time to simply change in the room and then use the communal bathroom on their way out, as opposed to going back and forth between it and the room multiple times.

The two quickly dressed and the trio decided on their items, which involved Riku having to explain to them that the rules said only one elixir per team, as well as other item restrictions. He didn’t want them getting disqualified on a technicality because they didn't bother reviewing the rules. Riku ended up with the elixir, as well as three potions, as he mostly used physical attacks so was most likely to get hit; Kairi had half potions and half ethers, as she had a limited breadth of magic but her healing and support magic were excellent; and Sora had all ethers because he planned to basically sit in the back and do magic—that was the main skill set he wanted to test, after all.

Once ready, the group headed down to eat breakfast—or rather, brunch at that point. Riku grabbed the scroll of rules on the way out; he’d lecture them on it during breakfast. 

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku, Sora, and Kairi filed into the stadium along with the rest of the competitors as Phil spoke to the audience. Riku didn’t hear much of what he was saying; he couldn’t remember being this nervous before. For some reason this opening ceremony was nerve-wracking. All they needed to do was stand there in a line with the other competitors and step forwards when Phil said their team name, so why was he so nervous? Was he actually getting stage-fright? He hoped he wouldn’t feel this way when fighting, too; he never fought in front of an audience before, after all, or at least not such a large one that would actively be judging him, cheering and booing and whatnot. Plus, this audience had literal gods and goddesses in it, including Zeus himself!

Sora grabbed his hand and smiled at Riku; he did the same with Kairi on his other side, who also seemed quite nervous. Sora was completely fine though—which made sense, as he’d fought in the coliseum before, even if this format was a bit different.

“Sea-Salt, featuring Sora, Riku, and Kairi—also known as the Heroes of Worlds, who saved everyone from the darkness just a few short months ago!”

Riku blushed as everyone cheered. Sora stepped forwards, pulling Riku and Kairi with him, and lifted their hands up, grinning broadly at the audience. Riku and Kairi’s smiles were smaller, more nervous. Then they stepped back, and Phil announced some more people. Riku’s heart pounded.

“And now,” Phil said, once everyone had been introduced and the line had filed into their seats along the sides of the stadium, where they’d be watching all the competition. “Now, time for the pre-tournament entertainment! We have quite the celebrity group here, four scions of Zeus himself—yes, you heard right, four of the big guy’s daughters—some of the goddesses of song and dance, the sister muses Calliope, Euterpe, Erato, Terpsichore, and Polyhymnia!”

Riku frowned and looked to Sora, who he noticed counting on his fingers. So he too realized Phil had given the wrong number.

“Zeus has five daughters?” Kairi whispered from Riku’s other side; somehow he ended up in the middle of his two best friends. Riku was surprised at Zeus having daughters too; for some reason, it hadn’t occurred to him that the god could have a family.

“Oh, he has dozens of kids,” Sora said nonchalantly, then shrugged. “He’s like thousands of years old or something.” Sora paused momentarily. “You know, Hades has a daughter, too, come to think of it.”

Riku and Kairi both nearly gagged. “You’re joking,” Riku decided.

Sora shrugged. “Yeah, I was surprised too. I think he actually has a few kids.” Riku rolled his eyes; Sora must be pulling their legs. That guy, with kids? Not wanting to give the idea any more thought, Riku turned his attention to the muses, who had begun to dance and sing.

The muses were absolutely enchanting. Since the stands circled the coliseum, so did three of the muses, twirling and twisting as they wove their beautiful song, accompanied by lyres that they skillfully played with delicate fingers. The other two sat on either side, playing a lovely melody with large golden harps. Riku began to sway slightly to the music, just like practically everyone else in the coliseum. It was extremely calming music; all of Riku’s nervousness faded as he listened. Next to him, Sora grabbed Riku’s arm and navigated it around his shoulder in order to lean into him; Riku did the same on his other side with Kairi, who leaned into him too. Riku couldn’t remember when he’d been happier than this.

Unfortunately, this peaceful feeling didn’t last long. The music must have been enchanted, as Riku’s nervousness quickly returned as the muses’ song ended and the tournament itself began. 

The competition looked tough, to say the least; glancing to the side, Riku noted that even Sora looked slightly worried, too. From what Riku gathered of what Sora had said earlier, prior tournaments had been largely fighting rounds of heartless followed by the occasional stronger non-heartless, and just as much a battle of stamina as skill; however, now, despite being fewer rounds, it was entirely non-heartless, and from the looks of it, pretty powerful competitors. They had come from all over the world, after all. This very well could prove tougher than the previous tournaments, and it looked like Sora realized it.

This was only confirmed as the fights went on, and Riku realized that that many of the competitors were literal gods and goddesses. Who fought whom was done via a lottery system, so there would be no time to devise a strategy ahead of time—however they still needed to watch the fights, so they could be at least a little prepared to fight in future rounds. They also had to stay focused as they could be called at any time; Riku nudged Sora to stop him from falling asleep. The current fight might be somewhat boring, but they still had to watch in case they fought them.

As it turned out, their team was not called to fight that day. 

As they left the coliseum, the three discussed the fights while strolling around the festivities around the outside of the coliseum, which was swarming with people all excited to spend their munny at the various stalls selling souvenirs, food, and all sorts of other things, some which were illegal on the islands, such as the tent run by Eros’ daughter Hedone, which Riku had to stop both Kairi and Sora from exploring, although Riku was certainly tempted to enter it too, drawn in by the succubi and sirens that danced outside of it. He really hoped they wouldn’t have to fight Eros or any other sex-related gods, spirits, and other creatures that had entered the tournament—their battles generally consisted of trying, and mostly succeeding, at seducing and tricking their opponents into giving up, fighting their friends, or in one case disqualification by removal of uniform. If resisting Hedone’s tent was this difficult, they’d be in for a tough battle if they had to face those kinds of opponents.

Suddenly, Riku noticed Sora was missing—had he gone into the tent after all? Panic began to rise, but then subsided as Riku caught the brunette’s spiky hair in the distance. He and Kairi ran to catch up to Sora. Of course he would be at one of the food stalls. 

Sora was already busy eating a bowl of some gelatinous orange goop. “This is really good!” he claimed. “You should try some!”

Riku was skeptical. The sign said it was ‘porange pudding’, a specialty of a place called Hamil, and it was that booth’s featured item. It looked vaguely like tapioca pudding, with the exception that it was, again, bright orange. A porange must be some sort of fruit, Riku concluded, as everything else the seller sold was fruit-based—Riku recognized some of the other flavors such as kirima, amango, kiwi, and cactus fruit. Riku wasn’t sure why Sora had chosen to get pudding, of all things, when there were also delectable-looking tarts and pies there too, although on closer inspection the fillings for such appeared to be various puddings and custards as well.

“Aww, come on, Riku, don’t make that face! It really is good!” Sora claimed. Before Riku could properly react, Sora was shoving a spoonful of the strange food into his mouth. 

To Riku’s complete surprise, the pudding tasted absolutely delicious despite its neon appearance; Riku couldn’t help licking his lips and smiling slightly. It tasted a bit like a cross between a peach and an orange.

“See? Told you! You gotta try new things, Riku—there’s food and stuff from all different worlds here!” Sora said. It was true—Olympus Coliseum was one of the few places where people from all worlds gathered, and the various booths here reflected this. Riku wondered if they’d ever find themselves visiting the world called Hamil someday.

“Try this too!” Kairi said, who apparently had bought something while Sora had been forcing the porange pudding on him. She held a spoon up to his face.

“Okay, okay,” Riku laughed, sampling the warm ‘napple pie’ Kairi was trying to feed him.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Number 57, team Sea-Salt!” Phil called, and Riku, Kairi, and Sora stood up. They walked to the side of the stadium Phil gestured to, and the satyr introduced them to the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen—” some hissing from the audience—“oh, right, and those in-between or without or whatever too”—more booing—“Okay, okay! Beings of all types!" the satyr settled on, which seemed to sate the crowd. Riku wondered why the satyr seemed so annoyed at that; surely he was well aware that a large portion of the audience, particularly the gods, spirits, and non-human species, weren't male nor female? The thought floated away as the satyr continued introducing them, "Anyway, here’s one of the more famous teams you’ve been waiting to see—that’s right, it’s the recent saviors of the universe in the flesh—Sora, Riku, and Kairi!”

Riku felt his face redden as the crowd cheered. They were that well-known? He began to feel nervous again, but felt better when Sora grabbed his and Kairi’s hands, giving them a squeeze and a smile. That smile did not last long, though, as Phil announced their opponents.

“Number 8,” Phil announced, “Team Oblivion: Erebus, the literal personification of Darkness, and Aether, the literal personification of light! Yes, these two beings, unseen by mortal eyes in thousands of years, literally created dark and light, as well as spawned the Titans who then spawned the Gods!”

The three islanders glanced at each other in worry. Was he serious? They were going to fight beings that created the universe?

Then Phil frowned. “Wait a second. If you two are defeated, doesn’t that mean light and dark are destroyed, plunging the universe into nothingness? And aren’t primordial deities banned from coliseum fights anyway? Why would you even want to fight?”

Neither being, whom no one seemed to be able to figure out the shape of other than that one was a glowing light and the other pure darkness, said a word.

Phil turned to Zeus. “Hey, is this allowed?”

Zeus stood up and frowned. “As this situation had never been fathomed, there is technically no rule against such.” Then he turned to the deities. “Although, considering everything, I would suggest you do not partake in the tournament…”

“That is okay. We did not plan to,” said (or rather, imparted directly into their minds?) both of them at once. “We merely wished to meet those that protected us.” They bowed to the trio, or at least that was the impression Riku got. “Thank you. We look forward to your future assistance.”

The trio nodded, stammering out “you’re welcome”s, and the deities possibly smiled before vanishing. Riku was left pondering, and slightly concerned about, what they meant by needing future assistance.

The coliseum was still for a moment before Phil spoke again. “Ooooohkay then. Well, not sure why they had to enter the tournament just to say that, but seeing as they’ve vanished, I’m going to go ahead and say they’ve forfeited. So, congrats, kids, you win by default.” The audience made sounds of disgruntlement. “Sorry everyone, gotta wait until tomorrow to see these heroes fight! Now, time for our midday entertainment...” 

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Kairi crashed on the bed spread-eagle and made an annoyed growling sound. “Seriously? A default win? I wanted to fight!!”

Riku raised an eyebrow. “Fight darkness and light personified?”

Kairi sighed. “Well, no, I guess not… but still…”

“Relax, Kairi, we’ve got five more fights ahead of us!” Sora said, bouncing onto the end of the bed with a plate of fancy cheeses, grapes, figs, and petit fours he’d pilfered from the dining hall. Part of the fairly hefty entry fee (which they’d get back with interest if they reached a high enough place in the tournament) included all-hour access to a cafeteria containing fairly expensive foods compared to what the trio was used to; although technically they could ask Merlin’s fridge for them, Riku supposed—they just hadn’t thought to do so, as they again weren’t used to eating such exquisite foods.

“Assuming we win all our matches,” Kairi pointed out.

Sora laughed. “Don’t worry, Kairi, we’ll be fine. And even if we don’t win, it’ll be tons of fun! And all the festivities are awesome too, you can’t deny that.”

“Definitely,” Riku agreed, glad that Sora was feeling so happy; it’d been too long since Riku had seen such unbridled optimism and joy in his friend. 

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Welcome all to day three of our championship tournament!” Phil announced. “First, after two days of round one, we finally have reached the second round! I’ll get right to it, then…” he rolled the lotto machine and looked at the ball. “Our first match of the day—and their first actual match after a surprise default win—Team Sea-Salt, consisting of Sora, Riku, and Kairi, recent saviors of the universe! Yes, the battle you’ve been waiting for! Now, for their opponent…” he selected another ball. “Oh my! Well, this will sure be an interesting match! Team Pain, consisting of Achos, Ania, and Lupe—otherwise known as The Algea. Yes, these are the spirits of pain and suffering themselves! This is going to be quite a match, folks!”

Riku steeled himself for battle; this would be a tough one, judging by the previous day’s fight they’d watched this team in. They appeared somewhat humanoid, although they were slightly translucent and were engulfed in a red glow. They also had demon horns. Apparently, they could cause people to feel pain, sadness, and a whole other slew of sufferings just by proximity, so one had to try to fight through it or stay far away. Regular weapons also went right through them, though they did seem to be affected by weapons imbued with magic. Riku glanced at Sora, who nodded. Magic was the key to victory; it was up to him.

A buzzer rang, signalling the start of the match. Immediately, Riku cringed as his nerves all lit up in a dull ache; he looked up to see one of the Algea right in front of him. He hadn’t expected them to be this fast! Riku slashed his keyblade across it, making sure to imbue some dark magic in it, and although it went through the creature retreated a few paces and Riku’s pain receded slightly.

Suddenly, a beam of light seared into the creature, pushing it away; being incorporeal, the spirit sailed right through the coliseum wall. Riku turned to see Sora grinning, keyblade pointed at where it had been.

“Well, folks, that’s out of bounds for Lupe! What a powerful attack; definitely befitting of someone who saved the worlds multiple times! Oh, but what’s this? Looks like the cool-down left an opening for Ania! She has Sora on his knees, no doubt feeling much sorrow!”

“Sora!” Riku turned and dashed towards his friend, slashing away the creature and kneeling next to the brunette, putting his hand on his shoulder and shaking him. “Hey, come on, stand up…” Riku swayed on his feet slightly, starting to feel awful grief, remembering how Ansem had taken him over, watching as he attacked his friends…

“Hey, hold it together!” Kairi shouted, grabbing Riku by the shoulders; she created some sort of warm light that wrapped around Riku’s skin and snapped him out of his dark thoughts right away. She tapped Sora, wrapping him in light too, who shook his head and stood up, looking at her wide-eyed. Both Riku and Sora glowed with a thin film of light.

“What did you do?” Riku asked, noting that the sorrow spirit was still nearby yet not causing them to feel anything. 

Kairi shrugged. “I don’t seem to be bothered by them, and Sora’s light attack took it out easily, so I assume they must prey on darkness. So I shrouded you two in light.”

“Huh. What do you know,” Riku said, impressed—Kairi was great at protective magic, but a light barrier was new. Riku grinned. “Alright, let’s get them!”

The three rushed one of the remaining Algea, who shrieked as three light-shrouded keyblades ran through it. The demon-thing collapsed and didn’t get up.

“I surrender!” the last one called at that point, hands up.

“And that’s the match!” Phil declared. “Thanks to what appears to have been a clever light-based defense by Kairi, neutralizing the Algea’s abilities, this battle goes to team Sea-Salt! That’s a Princess of Light for you!”

The crowd roared as Sora grabbed Riku and Kairi’s hands, holding them up and then bowing, the other two following. Then they returned to their seats. 

The next few battles were relatively normal, mostly fought by more-or-less evenly-matched mortal non-deities, although there were a few that were definitely not fair, such as the freaking god-of-war and two other gods fighting what Riku identified as Hades’ imp minions. Riku had a feeling Ares would be a finalist if not the winner. Sea-Salt surely wouldn’t stand a chance against him.

There was a brief break in-between rounds where

Phil looked at a ball and announced the next team. “Next is team X, which includes Max Goof, son of the head of Disney Castle’s knights”—the boy seemed to groan at this introduction—“and his friends P.J. Pete and Bobby Zimuruski!” Three college-age kids skateboarded into their places and kicked up their boards to their hands in sync. One looked like, well, a smaller version of Goofy; the second was a short yet obese anthromorphic cat; and the third was possibly a light-colored anthromorphic dog or similar species sporting an orange mohawk and sunglasses. The crowd cheered weakly for them.

“Did you know Goofy has a son?” Riku asked Sora in a whisper.

Sora shook his head. “He never mentioned one. And that other kid looks a lot like Pete…”

“Oh, gods, do not even go there,” Kairi said with a shiver.

Phil announced who they’d be competing against. “Oh, this match might be very one-sided, folks! Looks like their opponents are Sea-Salt! You all know their names: Sora, Riku, and Kairi, the saviors of the universe!” The crowd exploded with sound, ten times louder than for the other team; Riku felt slightly bad about that.

The buzzer sounded and the battle began. The other team immediately got on their skateboards and circled around; based on the team’s previous fights, Riku knew they liked to move fast, attempting to confuse their opponents and trying to strike from behind. The mohawk one would stay at a distance and throw disks that looked like CDs infused with various effects; Goofy’s kid had a shield like his father which he would ram people with; and Pete’s kid (?) used magic, mostly support-type like barriers and power-increasing things, as well as healing spells. Huh. Not what Riku would expect from Pete’s kid; maybe the looks and name were a coincidence.

Riku signaled to Sora and Kairi; they’d work on taking out the cat and Riku would protect them from the attacks of the other two.

Kairi used some attack- and magic-increasing spells on the three of them and then charged PJ, who put up a barrier as Max tried defending him by ramming Kairi while Riku was distracted protecting the two from Bobby. Sora got in the way of Max before he could strike Kairi.

Kairi yelled at Sora. “What are you doing? You get back there and cast, I can handle myself!”

Sora looked surprised and then hopped away to prepare some magic, shooting a quick fireball, which didn’t require charging, at Pete to prevent him from casting something. The cat staggered back, then Riku jumped in front of Kairi to block some disks flying her way.

“Riku, you need to protect Sora!” Kairi scolded. “I can handle some disks!” As if to prove such, she expertly dodged away from another volley of disks, using the ‘light roll’ move she’d figured out with Riku’s help, a variation on his ‘dark roll’.

Riku turned to Sora, who was defending himself from Max’s attacks. Darn it; Sora needed to cast! Kairi was right, they had to stick to the plan. She could handle herself.

Riku quickly darted in front of Sora, putting up a dark barrier to shield him from Max. Riku noticed the disk guy try to toss some towards them; Riku tried to block those too, but got struck. Kairi rushed over, quickly using a cure spell and helping defend Sora, who was charging up some sort of large spell. Hopefully he’d do it before the cat finished his own spell, as they’d left that one open.

Thankfully, Sora did; the ground shook under PJ, who shouted in alarm as spiky rocks shot up from underneath him. Somehow he managed to survive, and Bobby tossed a green disk at him, healing him.

Sora swore. Riku, however, immediately tackled the disk kid with a downward keyblade strike; having to heal his friend had caused him to pause, allowing Riku to catch the skateboarder. The guy collapsed, unconscious.

“And that’s one down!” Phil announced. “I have to say, team X is holding up better than expected! Though part of that was caused by some inter-team strife in the beginning on Sea-Salt’s end; seems battle was not the place for chivalry! But it looks like it’s smooth sailing for them now, folks…”

Phil was certainly right about that. While Riku defended Sora from Max’s strikes, Kairi went to fight PJ again, who seemed to have given up using support spells and larger spells that required charging, instead rapidly casting smaller yet speedy attack spells like fireballs which Kairi easily countered with water ones and expert dodging. She didn’t try moving in for the attack though; she was distracting the cat while staying out-of-range of whatever spell Sora was about to use.

“Meteor!” Sora suddenly shouted, and a gigantic, well, meteor materialized over PJ, who looked up, eyes wide. 

Suddenly, Max was there, holding his shield up above him to defend his friend—and succeeding. He conjured a small barrier centered around his shield, and the meteor crashed around it, causing a circle of destruction around the two while leaving them unscathed. Shards from the meteor flew towards the walls of the stadium, causing people to duck and bits of stone to mar the edges of the ring.

“TIME OUT!” Phil called as he hit the buzzer. Everyone froze as he stomped onto the battlefield towards Sora. “What have you been told about those types of spells? If you destroy the coliseum again, you are rebuilding it stone-by-stone, without magic! Two words: Tone it down!”

“Sorry,” Sora said quietly, with a sheepish look.

“Also, no killing anyone, either,” Phil added as an afterthought. “This ain’t the Underdrome. If they hadn’t defended, they’d have been toast. There’s no healing from that. You can go all-out like that on gods, sure, but not mortals, got it? Big spells are fine, but only use spells that can be healed—which is the vast amount of spells, so don’t complain about it being a restriction, because it doesn’t limit you much at all.”

Sora nodded. “Got it.”

“Good.” Phil stomped away and took his place back at the announcer’s podium. “Okay, now that that’s settled, let the match resume!” The buzzer sounded.

Max and PJ whispered between themselves, looking at Sora with a somewhat frightened expression. Then they took deep breaths and both resumed their prior strategy, focused largely on taking out Sora. Like before, it didn’t work too well. Max did manage to get past Riku once with some sort of spinning attack, but Sora easily dodged, and even laughed slightly; it looked like a move Goofy often used.

Riku wasn’t sure what spell Sora planned on using, but it was taking a long time to charge.

“Kairi! Riku! Plant your keyblades in the ground!” Sora yelled; the two did so as Sora held his arm up and yelled “Tornado Storm!”

A gigantic grey tornado coalesced, drawing everything around it in. Infused in the tornado were water and lightning—it was a storm in the form of a tornado, true to its name. However, it was indiscriminate to whom it sucked in, with the exception of Sora. Riku and Kairi braced against the wind, holding tightly to their keyblades. PJ and Max weren’t so lucky, though—the tornado had formed right on top of PJ, and Max not only had nothing to brace against but was on a skateboard, meaning he was nearly immediately drawn in despite having been fairly far away.

Suddenly, the tornado dissipated. Riku stumbled a bit at the sudden halt of the pull. Max and PJ fell to the ground, completely unconscious. Well, hopefully just unconscious—Riku did not want to have to explain to Goofy that Sora killed his son.

Speaking of Sora, it looked like he was about to collapse—which he did, right into Riku’s arms as soon as he saw Riku appear next to him. Riku picked him up bridal-style while double-checking that he was only unconscious.

“And that’s the end of the match, folks! In an astounding display of magic, team Sea-Salt has claimed victory! Seriously, folks, I have not seen a human perform such magic in centuries, not since Merlin himself fought here! What’s that combine, four elements? Five?” he paused and looked towards the trio, seemingly wanting an answer; Kairi and Riku, having never seen the spell before either, shrugged. Sora couldn’t answer of course. Phil continued, “Well, looks like the spell drained our hero to the point of passing out, but whatever it is, it’s more elements than most humans can ever hope to attempt to merge! Now, onto the next match...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Coliseum, part 2! Will our heroes become champions?


	7. Olympus Coliseum (part 2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final rounds of the tournament! Will team Sea-Salt prevail?
> 
> Also, the tournament brings about some surprising (well, maybe not that surprising) revelations about each other.

Kairi headed back to her seat while Riku brought Sora to the infirmary; she’d tried to go with them, but someone had to watch the other matches. Goofy’s kid and his friends were carried there too, by some nurses. The medical room was huge and nearly full. No one there seemed to have truly major injuries, but nearly all were clearly mortal humans. 

A nurse scuttled over to them. “Oh, my oh my, and what do we have here? Taken out by a god, I presume? Oh, they really ought to have separate tournaments for mortals and immortals…”

“Actually, we won our fight,” Riku informed her. “Pretty sure Sora’s just exhausted his mana; it’s the first time he’s used such a powerful spell in battle.”

The nurse appeared relieved at that. “Well, that’s not so bad, then, set him on a bed and I’ll—”

Another nurse interrupted, one of the ones tending to Max and his friends. “Yes, and when he wakes up tell him to never use magic like that on mortals, and especially not when there’s a crowd so close by! It’s lucky they were able to block that meteor, and that storm tornado could have drawn in half the audience! It was a near thing, too; most had to grab their seats! If he didn’t stop it when he did—”

The nurse Riku had been speaking to put a hand on the other’s shoulder. “Iaso, that’s enough. You’re disturbing the patients.”

“But Aceso, you didn’t see it!”

“Phil already scolded Sora about the meteor,” Riku pointed out calmly, after setting Sora on a bed. “Halfway through the match, at that. And the storm tornado was well within the limits Phil had given Sora. Besides, that was by far not the most devastating attack we’ve seen in this tournament.”

“Yes, but all those other attacks were used on immortals who could easily survive them or return from death,” Iaso hissed. “It’s only a matter of time before one of them accidentally uses such on a mortal and kills them!”

Aceso sighed. “I do agree there. We can ask about separating future tournaments based on mortality.”

A third nurse interrupted. “That isn’t going to work though; this kid isn’t the only mortal we’ve seen use god-level magic or abilities, and many spirits and gods actually don’t have much, if any, more physical strength than mortals.”

“I have an idea,” Riku interrupted, and the three turned to him. “Why don’t you attach some magic to the uniforms that caps magic and ability use at a certain level, or prevents them from receiving enough damage to kill? That can be done, right?”

“Yes it can,” said a young pallid girl who seemed to be listening in. “I can ask my father about it. I can get Mac to help too; Daddy doesn’t like the coliseum much, but if we both ask he’ll undoubtedly agree to help.”

“Who’s your father?” Riku asked.

“Hades.”

Riku was sure his jaw had fallen on the floor. He had thought Sora had been joking.

The girl giggled. “That’s how almost everyone reacts. My name’s Melinoë. My sister is Macaria.”

Riku nodded, still in disbelief that Hades had a daughter, let alone two. “Right. So you’re goddesses, then?”

“Yup!” Melinoë said happily. “Mac’s just a regular goddess of death—pretty boring, if you ask me. I, however, have a more fun job, being in charge of nightmares and madness! Oh, don’t be like that—I won’t give cuties like you nightmares.”

Riku had semi-consciously stepped to the side to shield Sora. He was not at all sure what to make of this, especially at the way the goddess had called him and Sora cute and had crept closer to them with a sly, vaguely salacious expression Riku did not at all like.

“So, you’re fighting in the tournament too?” Riku asked, even though he did remember seeing her fight, but he was trying to keep the conversation going. He didn’t think she’d do anything to Sora, but still…

The goddess actually pouted and crossed her arms at that. “Hmph. I was! And doing pretty well at it, too. Pasithea creates some hallucinations, I add some madness in, they attack each other. Simple. How was I supposed to know that would cause the guy to use some berserk ability that could take out the entire field, allies and himself included? And it didn’t even end in a tie, because he stayed conscious for barely a single second longer than us… Ugh. So unfair, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, totally unfair,” Riku quickly agreed.

“What’s unfair?” Sora asked, apparently awake and already starting to sit up. Then he noticed who Riku was talking to, and his eyes lit up. “Oh! Hey, Melinoë!”

Riku turned to look at Sora in disbelief. “You know her?!” Oh, who was he kidding—of course Sora would manage to befriend the freaking goddess of insanity.

“Yeah, I met her when I was in the Underworld.”

Melinoë grinned, and Riku noticed she had pointed teeth. “So this is the Riku you were looking for, I take it?” she asked, voice slightly teasing. Riku wasn’t surprised that Sora had managed to talk to Hades’s daughter about him; apparently, everyone who had met Sora over the past couple years knew about Riku.

“Yup! This is him!” Sora said happily, jumping up, putting an arm around Riku’s waist, and leaning into him slightly. Riku automatically draped his arm around Sora’s shoulders in response.

“So, where’s the third member of your team?” Melinoë asked curiously. “Kairi, was it? She looked like an excellent fighter.”

“She is!” Sora said proudly. 

The goddess grinned slyly. “Pure light, too, I noticed. Amazing how she was able to block the Algea’s abilities… I wonder if she’d be able to resist mine, too…”

“Don’t even think about it,” Riku told her sternly.

Sora laughed. “She’s just joking, Riku. Er. You are joking, right?” he asked the girl warily.

“Oh, but of course. Besides, even if I weren’t, Daddy says you’re off-limits.”

Sora and Riku both said nothing for a moment before simultaneously saying “What?”

Melinoë shrugged. “It is what it is…” she glanced behind the two. “Oh, looks like Pasithea is awake now. Well, see you later, Sora, Riku.” She drifted away to somewhere across the room, leaving Sora and Riku to wonder why they and Kairi had been deemed off-limits by Hades. Maybe he just liked riling up Sora himself, or maybe he’d given the order back when they were needed for various plots and forgot to lift it. Riku really hoped that was all it was, and not yet another plot brewing.

Aceso came over holding the ether she’d promised earlier; Riku got the feeling she’d intentionally been avoiding being there while Melinoë was. “Oh, wow. You’re actually awake,” the nurse commented, seeming slightly confused. “Well, take this, then; if you’re good to go, we’ll need you to leave as we’re running out of room.” She handed Sora the item and shuffled off to another patient.

Sora took the ether and he and Riku left to return to watch the rest of the day’s matches, glad their battles were over until tomorrow.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Hey, do you know Sora knows Hades’s daughter?” Riku asked Kairi as they walked around the festival that evening. 

Kairi blinked in surprise. “Wait, what? He wasn’t joking about Hades having kids?”

“Apparently not. We met her in the infirmary; her name is Melinoë. She has a sister named Macaria.”

Kairi stared at Riku in shock, apparently having trouble processing. “Hades has a daughter, and Sora is friends with her,” Kairi reiterated.

“Well, I dunno if I’d call them friends, per se, but they know each other and are friendly.”

Kairi shook her head, an expression of amazement on her face. “Wow. Sora really can befriend almost anyone; what’s next, a god of insanity or something?”

Riku laughed. “That’s actually Melinoë.”

Kairi’s jaw dropped. “Okay, now you’re just fucking with me.”

“Nope. Hey, where is Sora, anyway?” Riku looked around, and Kairi followed suit. 

“I bet he got distracted by food, or maybe one of those little games,” Kairi said. It was a pretty big area, with lots of stalls and tents to get lost between; Riku supposed it had only been a matter of time before they lost Sora. “He’ll be fine,” Kairi added.

“Let’s look for him anyway,” Riku suggested. “I wouldn’t put it past him to accidentally wander into the Sirens’ tent or something.”

Kairi laughed. “True, very true… oh, hey, there he is!”

Riku and Kairi headed over to where Sora was chatting with Hercules and a very voluptuous woman that had her arm around Sora. Riku took a deep breath, quelling the twinge of jealousy.

“Riku! Kairi!” Sora cheered, waving them over. “This is Hercules and his girlfriend, Meg!”

“You introduced us to Hercules yesterday,” Riku pointed out, noting a glass of what he hoped was juice in Sora’s hand, then he held his own hand out to Meg. “I’m Riku; it’s nice to meet you.”

Meg ignored Riku’s hand, instead choosing to move from Sora to slink her arm around Riku’s shoulders. Riku blushed as Meg cooed, “Hello there, handsome. Herc, I think you’ve got some competition.”

Hercules laughed, apparently unphased by his girlfriend clearly flirting with others. They must be extremely secure in their relationship for him to not get jealous at all. Riku noticed Kairi subtly trying to take a photo, to his embarrassment.

“Oh!” Sora suddenly said. “Herc, your fight was right after ours, wasn’t it? I was in the infirmary during it; how’d that go? Bet you knocked them into next week.” He elbowed Hercules with a grin.

Hercules sighed. “I lost, actually. But it’s fine!” he said as he noticed Sora’s face fall slightly. “My team just got a bad draw, having to fight Ares and his crew, so it was basically over before it began. They’ll definitely end up being first place.”

Riku frowned. “Doesn’t seem fair that a God of War gets to participate,” he said as Meg slunk back over to Hercules.

Hercules shrugged. “It is what it is. Besides, my brother would probably start a war if they banned him from fighting.”

“Wait. he’s your brother?!” Sora exclaimed in disbelief.

Hercules laughed. “Well, yeah. Zeus is my dad, after all. Technically I’m related to most of the gods in some way, because of that.”

“Wait, but I thought you were mortal?”

“Well, I am. It’s complicated. Everything about the gods is complicated; our family tree is more like a tangled thorn bush. Anyway, back to Ares: If you end up facing him, I’d recommend forfeiting, even with that awesome storm tornado you can conjure.”

Sora blushed. “It’s not that impressive; I bet loads of people can do that.”

Meg raised an eyebrow. “Seriously, kid? Do you have self-esteem issues or something? I’ve never seen anything like that from a mortal. It combines what, four types of magic?”

Sora nodded. “Yeah. It’s actually simpler than it seems: magnega and aeroga used together combine to make the tornado, and then you add in waterga and thundaga separately to make it a storm.”

“Sora, that is anything but simple,” Riku commented. “You’re talking about combining four high-level spells; most people can barely manage to cast one, let alone four at once. Hell, most mages don’t even manage to learn more than one or two high-level spells, period!”

Sora shrugged. “I guess… oh, hey, Herc, you said there’s sea-salt ice cream around here, right?” he asked in a clear attempt to change the subject, which worked as Hercules laughed while showing Sora the way.

Riku and Kairi smiled at each other in fond exasperation. 

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Come on, get up,” Riku told Kairi and Sora, standing over the two and poking them slightly.

“Nooo. It’s too early!” Sora whined, curling into the blanket more.

“No, it’s not,” Riku argued. “It’s 8am and we have a lot of training to do.”

“Sleep can be training,” Kairi mumbled.

Riku sighed. “We potentially have three battles this afternoon, most likely against gods. We need to talk strategy—especially if we need to fight Ares, which there’s a good chance we will.”

Sora groaned as he sat up. “Seriously? Herc lost to him; we might as well forfeit first thing if we’re up against him.”

“No, we’re going to devise a strategy,” Riku said adamantly. “The guy’s super powerful, yes, but if we’ve learned anything from this tournament it’s that brute strength isn’t always the answer—some of the competitors didn’t even need to lay a hand on their opponents to win. Ares has a lot of weaknesses beneath that strength; I know we can defeat him if we strategize properly.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Today is the day you’ve been waiting for!” Phil announced. “The only day some of you have come to watch, as it’s sure to be a show: the final fights! Starting with the quarterfinals: four matches to determine the final four! Following that, the semifinals, with four teams fighting across two matches, followed by a match for third and then the final match! Are you ready?”

“Yeah!” the crowd screamed.

“Well then, let’s get right to it: first up…” he rolled the lotto ball. “Team War! An impressive battle right at the start! And they’re up against…” Riku held his breath, hoping it wouldn’t be them. He released the breath when Phil announced “Team 83—I mean, 38—team Fate, consisting of the Fates!”

Riku watched the match diligently, paying close attention to Team War’s fighting. Yes, just as expected… maybe they would have a chance—not to jinx it.

The battle, though it lasted slightly longer than expected, was over after less than ten minutes.

“Next up!” Phil called. “Let’s see… Team Sea-Salt!” Riku, Sora, and Kairi hopped up, taking their places on the side Phil indicated as he drew another number. “Their opponents: Team Darkwing!”

Three small ducks waddled over to the other side of the stadium; they wore dark clothes and masks, but Riku had a feeling that he knew them, which had been nagging him the whole tournament.

Sora gasped. “I knew I recognized them!” he proclaimed. “They’re Donald’s nephews! The ones that own the shops!”

Riku looked closer at the ducks. Yup, despite trying to hide their identity, those were undoubtedly Donald’s nephews. “Maybe we should go easy on them,” Riku suggested. “Don’t want to accidentally kill Donald’s nephews.”

The buzzer went off, signalling the match’s start.

“Or I could just take them out right away,” Sora said, grinning mischievously as wind magic started swirling around him.

“Stop! We forfeit!” called the ducks all together. Sora staggered slightly as he dissolved the spell.

“Well, folks, you heard them: Team Sea-Salt wins via forfeit! Guess those ducks realized they stood no chance, although it would have been quite fun to see them get trounced.”

The trio went back to their seats to watch the final two quarterfinal matches. The first one was rather boring; both teams used persuasion and trickery as their primary means of fighting, meaning it involved a lot of talking and subtle magic rather than displays of strength or showy magic. Riku really wished he could hear what was whispered between the competitors; the team that won had consisted of spirits whom commanded things like deception, persuasion, seduction, and jealousy, which would be a major issue if the trio fought them. Riku had been manipulated before via his jealousy, after all. The last quarterfinal match ended much like Sea-Salt’s: the mortal team that had previously gotten lucky draws to only fight other mortals in their prior matches surrendered right away at having to face a couple of cyclopes. Riku scoffed at that; cyclopes were fairly easy to defeat, as all you had to do was knock them over—an easy feat, given their slow speed and size—and then stab them in the eye. After that, they became completely vulnerable to attack. Hopefully they’d be the ones Riku’s team would end up going against…

After a short break, during which Donald’s nephews popped over to the three teens to beg them not to tell Donald the ducklings had participated in the tournament, it was time for the semifinals.

“First up: Team Envy, consisting of Peitho, the personification of persuasion and seduction—and sure looks it—with her equally beguiling teammates Dolos, the spirit of trickery and deception, and Phthonus, master of envy and jealousy! Now, for their opponent…” Phil rolled the lotto machine as Riku prayed it wouldn’t be them fighting—to no avail. “Team Sea-Salt! As you all know…”

Riku’s head spun as Phil continued introducing them while they headed to their place. He looked towards Kairi and Sora, who looked equally as concerned. From watching this team, they mostly won by convincing members to fight each other… were the trio’s bonds strong enough to endure such? Or would Riku be unable to resist becoming jealous again? True, he rarely did feel jealous anymore, and when he did he stomped it out quickly, but these spirits were masters at drawing it out. 

Sora grabbed Riku’s hand, and then Kairi’s on his other side. “We got this,” he said adamantly. “We’re strong. We won’t give in. Remember, whatever they say, it isn’t true. And if it is, we can talk later, so don’t fight each other over it.”

Riku blinked at the second half of that, wondering what Sora meant—were there secrets amongst them?—but the buzzer rang then, leaving no more time to dwell on it. Riku, Sora, and Kairi attacked first. Kairi ran towards the girl, as they knew she used seduction, and Riku and Sora each took a guy, though weren’t sure which was which. It didn’t particularly matter though, as they deployed similar strategies.

The one Riku ended up fighting was green, though, so he figured there was a good chance it was the one that personified envy and jealousy, based on the idiom. The spirit was slippery, expertly dodging attacks and blocking Riku’s keyblade with his heavy gauntlets. Glancing over, Riku noticed Sora was in the same boat.

Glancing over at Kairi, Riku noticed something odd. It should have been easy for her—Peitho relied on seduction to do her work, so Kairi should be immune. Yet Kairi’s eyes were pink, under some spell, and she was standing there with Peitho’s arm around her as the spirit whispered in her ear. Well, the goddess was also one of persuasion, so maybe she had Kairi trapped via some other whispers.

“Well then,” Phil commentated. “Seems Sea-Salt’s strategy has backfired: like other teams, they tried sending a female fighter to quell the spirit of seduction, which generally is a successful strategy—yet instead of being immune to the goddess’s wiles, she’s been caught under a spell… oh no, wait! Not just any spell; Peitho is going in for a kiss, and the lass is not protesting! Well, looks like we may be in for a different kind of show, folks!”

Riku barely paid attention to the commentary; Kairi could hold her own, hopefully, despite not being as able to resist female seduction as everyone had anticipated. Meanwhile, Riku and Sora had somehow ended up back-to-back, dealing with their own whispers by the two spirits circling them… which seemed to revolve around Kairi?

“You can’t both have the girl,” the green one—Phthonus?—said.

“You might just have to fight over her,” the other—Dolos?—said.

“You know, I bet she likes Sora best,” Phthonus said to Riku.

“She definitely likes Riku best,” said the other to Sora. “But I’m sure she’ll choose you if he’s gone…”

Sora just raised an eyebrow at the spirits and grinned with mild amusement. “Seriously? Might want to read the room.” He nodded towards Kairi and Peithos. Riku really hoped that wasn’t her first kiss.

Phthonus paled to more yellow than green. “Fuck. Dolos, what do we do? This always works!” Riku grinned at that. So they weren’t very flexible with their strategy, were they?

“Too reliant on heteronormativity?” Riku asked teasingly, and the spirits growled in frustration. Though jealousy was actually seeping in, Riku realized—towards Peithos. If Riku was going to attack anyone out of jealousy, it’d be her. And from the way Sora looked at the two girls, he felt the same. Yeah, the spirits’ plan had definitely backfired two-fold.

“Psst, Riku,” Sora whispered. “Want to try that joint attack?”

“Eternal Session?” Riku asked.

“Yeah, that one!”

“We haven’t done that in a while though,” Riku argued. 

“Yeah but it’s so cool…”

Riku sighed. “Fine.” He lifted up his keyblade to prepare for the attack, closing his eyes to sync his heart with Sora’s as they had done in The World That Never Was, which ought to automatically initiate the attack, like muscle memory. Heart memory? Something like that. 

Suddenly, and completely unexpectedly, Riku’s normal keyblade was replaced by one called Mirage Split, although Riku had no idea how he knew the name of it. The same thing happened to Sora, although his keyblade was called Nightmare’s End. Whatever was happening, this was not the desired attack, but Riku just went with it. Eternal Session hadn’t actually been planned, either—they’d just followed their hearts to use it. Maybe this was like that, a new attack formed by their hearts. He lifted his arm up, crossing the new blade with Sora’s.

“Whoa, what’s this?” Phil commentated. “The boys just summoned new blades, and they’re combining them! Would you look at that—a giant rainbow sword! Hmm. Looks like Team Envy really missed the mark this time, if they’re trying to get those two boys to fight over the girl, as has worked for them in previous rounds this very competition.”

Riku didn’t hear the commentary much as he and Sora brought the shining rainbow keyblade down, tilting it slightly so it spiraled around them to strike both Dolos and Phthonus. The two spirits toppled to the ground and didn’t get back up as the combined keyblade dissolved.

“Kairi!” Riku and Sora both called, running over to her.

Phil continued the play-by-play. “Well, it’s three against one now as Riku and Sora rush in to save Kairi—what’s this? The boys are enamoured by Peithos, too? That’s unexpected! Perhaps all is not lost for the goddess—oh, nope, looks like the redhead snapped out of the trance… oww, that has got to hurt.”

“What the hell are you two doing?” Kairi snapped at Riku and Sora, her face red with embarrassment. Peithos lay at her feet, unconscious; Kairi had hit her over the head with the hilt of her keyblade while Sora and Riku had been staring open-mouthed at the goddess, completely enamoured.

“Um. Helping you?” Sora said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head in a nervous gesture.

Kairi raised an eyebrow. “By falling into her charm, too?”

“W-well, the distraction snapped you out of it, didn’t it?” Riku stammered.

The buzzer rang. “That’s the match, folks!” Phil called. “Sea-Salt is the victor! Something tells me they had some major revelations about themselves and each other, too.” The satyr chuckled a little. “Anyway, now it’s time for the other semifinal match…”

“Phew,” Riku said as he sat back into his seat. “That was… really something.” Sora and Kairi sat down on either side of him, both angling themselves to lean against Riku as they expressed similar sentiments.

Sora grinned and tilted his head to look at Kairi across Riku’s chest. “So, what was that you said before? ‘I can handle the girl; her seduction won’t work against me.’?”

Kairi blushed. “Shut up, Mister Giant Rainbow Keyblade.”

“Hey! Rainbows are cool,” Sora protested. “Riku, back me up!”

“Um. Sure,” Riku said, more focused on watching the battle in front of them; whomever won is who they’d be fighting in the final match. Probably Ares; he looked like he was playing around with the cyclopes more than actually fighting, likely trying to give the crowd a show instead of ending it immediately.

“See, Kairi? Riku agrees. Rainbows are cool,” Sora said.

“Okay, okay, I get it,” Kairi giggled. “So, what’s that cool new attack called?”

Sora frowned. “Um. I dunno. That was the first time we did it; we were trying for an Eternal Session but that happened instead.”

“Hmmm…” Kairi grinned slyly. “I got a name, then.”

“What?” Sora asked curiously.

“The Gayblade,” Kairi responded, a smug look on her face.

“What? Why?”

“Um, hello? It’s a giant rainbow keyblade with a paopu fruit keychain that two boys summon.”

Riku, now aware of the conversation, and Sora both looked at Kairi in surprise. “The keychain was a paopu fruit?” Riku asked. He hadn’t paid much attention to the design, on account of being in the middle of battling with the thing.

“Yup! I think maybe your hearts were telling you something, hmm?”

Sora looked more confused. “Well, we’re best friends, so of course it’d have something showing our hearts are connected, right?”

Kairi giggled. “If you say so.” She looked up at Riku, who felt his face redden as he gave a small shrug and a nervous smile. He understood what she was saying, even if Sora didn’t. This basically confirmed their feelings for each other… which confused Riku, as he was pretty sure he felt exactly the same over Kairi—and if he was reading things right, so did Sora. Riku was also fairly certain that Kairi felt the same about both of them too, despite that thing with Peithos. This was quite the mess to untangle… so Riku decided he wouldn’t. Things were nice how they were now. If either of the others wanted to proceed further, he’d let them make the first move. And if they decided to be with each other, Riku would be fine with that too, as long as they were happy. After all, that was how it worked: people ended up in couples, not trios… right? 

The buzzer went off before Riku could think about that any more. “Team War is the winner, as expected!” Phil announced. “Now, we have a brief half-hour intermission for bathroom breaks and snacks, and then it’s time for the third-place battle, directly followed by the battle you’ve been waiting for!”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Ladies and Gentlemen—okay, okay, Beings of All Sorts!—it’s time for the Final Match! In an unprecedented conclusion, Sea-Salt, a team of mortals, has climbed the ranks, defeating even gods, to find a place in the Final Match—a feat reflective of their status as Saviors of the Universe! But in a more predictable conclusion, their opponent is Team War, consisting of not only Ares, the god of war himself, but two other brutal fighters: Anaideia, god of ruthlessness and unforgivingness; and Eris, god of strife and rivalry! Which team will prevail? We all know who is expected to, but perhaps there will be a surprise instead! Regardless, this is sure to be a battle of a caliber you only see once-in-a-lifetime!”

“Talk about high-pressure,” Riku muttered, and Kairi and Sora giggled. Riku wasn’t that worried though; they’d devised a strategy that, even if it didn’t defeat them, would surely give the spectacle the audience desired.

As expected, as soon as the buzzer went off, Ares—on a horse, which shouldn’t technically be allowed, but it apparently was for him—charged at the trio. It was an easy dodge; Kairi and Sora darted to the side, making sure to defend against the other two who predictably followed to intercept the dodges, a classic opening move. However, Ares did not count on Riku sliding under the horse, lightly slashing its belly with his keyblade and smacking it on the rear as he jumped up. The horse, spooked, charged off the battlefield, forcing Ares to jump off.

“And the opening move is just as unexpected and impressive as expected!” Phil commentated. “Not even a minute in, and Ares has lost his horse! Oooh, and he sure looks angry about it! But Riku dodges: that god may be strong, but it’s no secret that his agility is poor! Meanwhile, on the other side of the field, it looks like Kairi may be in trouble, as the two other gods approach her together; but what’s this? Whoa, I have never seen an attack like that before, inflicting two status effects at once, but it appears to be effective!”

Riku smirked. It seems Sora had succeeded in the new yet-unnamed spell he’d invented, a combination of ‘blackout’, which inflicted the ‘blind’ status, and ‘confuse’, which, as the name suggested, inflicted the ‘confusion’ status. The two lesser gods blindly ran around; then, guided by Kairi and Sora’s voices, they started fighting each other, causing significant damage to each other as—even excluding the blindness—they were too confused to dodge properly.

“What the fuck are you two doing?!” Ares shouted angrily, attempting to rush over, only to be intercepted by Riku.

“What, afraid you can’t do this on your own? Can’t fight without your little supports?” Riku teased; it was a known fact that Ares could get angry very quickly, and anger meant sloppiness.

“Aaargh!” Ares yelled, attempting to knock Riku away with his sword, only to be charged from the side by Sora.

“What’s this?” Phil said. “Oooh, Ares, I’ve got three words for you, man: Anger management. Ares, in an attempt to charge Riku, who is using psychology as a strategy, has managed to overshoot an attack—an easy dodge for Riku, but not for Ares’s confused comrade behind the boy! Oof, that’s going to leave a mark as Anaideia goes the way of the horse, flying right out of the coliseum! Maybe we should get doors for the exit. Anyway, Team War has been reduced to two, folks, for the first time all tournament! Oh, but looks like Eris has recovered from the status effects; can Sea-Salt handle fighting both at once?”

Riku, Sora, and Kairi reconvenied for a quick meeting; across the stadium, Ares and Eris were doing the same. “Should we do it now?” Kairi asked, then she cast a cautionary cure spell on them all.

Sora shook his head. “No, let’s try taking Eris out first, then we can go all-out on Ares.

Riku nodded. “I don’t want to jinx this by saying it’s easier than expected, but Phil is right; that anger might cost him the match.”

“Then we keep playing it up,” Kairi suggested. “Maybe get him angry at Eris?”

Sora frowned. “Hmm. Or we can simply do what we did earlier…”

“They won’t fall for that again,” Riku pointed out.

Sora replied, “Well, yeah, I know that. But here’s what we can do…”

“Hey, bozos,” Phil said. “People are paying to watch you all fight, not talk.”

Sora laughed. “Well let’s fight then, not that they’ll be able to watch… okay, Kairi, let’s go!” Sora held up his keyblade and said “Poison fog!” as Kairi used a modified barrier spell to give them protection from the spell’s result. A purple smog billowed from Sora’s keyblade to cover the entire field—just the field, not the audience. They didn’t want to be responsible for poisoning the entire crowd. Even if the poison didn’t weaken their opponents, it would prevent the two gods from seeing—but not the three of them. Well, Kairi and Sora would have limited vision, but the barrier protected their eyes from being stung by the fog. Riku, on the other hand, had experience being blind, so could navigate without sight.

Riku closed his eyes, sensing where everyone was… he grabbed Sora’s hand to direct him, then they did a dual strike, catching Eris from behind with Riku doing a sonic strike to the leg while Sora cast a silence spell. Eris cried out, but couldn’t say a word as he stumbled, swerving around to attack Riku who had already dodged away. “Hey, Ares,” Riku yelled. “Let me guess, stuck?”

Ares growled. “You dare taunt me?!” Riku could hear the sound of Ares charging. Eris tried to move out of the way, but before he could, Sora had caught him with a stop spell, halting his movement. Riku easily dodged Ares’s charge and the war god slammed into Eris behind him.

“And Eris has been knocked out of here, too!” Phil proclaimed. “By whom, we don’t know, but from the strength behind it, I’d wager that Ares was tricked again!”

“Grrrrrrrrr!” Ares raged, using a large spinning attack that blew the mist away, though it seemed to have left him slightly dizzy.

Sea-Salt took advantage of this. Time to end it.

Kairi and Sora grabbed each other’s hands and shot forth a blinding burst of light, causing Ares to pause, unable to briefly see; Sora tossed Kairi into the air, and she flipped over, somersaulting and landing a spiraling downward strike on the god as the light dissipated before quickly jumping back. That had been the first time they’d executed their joint attack in battle, and it had been a success. 

Hopefully Kairi and Riku could pull off theirs, too. Immediately after Kairi returned, Riku grabbed her hand, and they held their keyblades out, creating small portals of swirling light and darkness which they swiftly hopped between in a series of unpredictable horizontal strikes imbued with light and darkness; Ares turned around and around, trying to hit them. Which he did: he hadn’t fully intended to, but in a rogue swing Ares hit Kairi with his fist, sending her across the field but thankfully not out of the ring.

“Kairi!” Sora called, starting to go towards her, but Riku appeared next to him and grabbed his hand.

“She’ll be fine! Come on, we have to finish this!” Riku said. He was worried about Kairi too of course, but he had to trust in her. The hit hadn’t looked too bad.

“Right,” Sora said with determination.

Sora and Riku summoned the keyblades for their new joint attack. Together, they lifted them up, and the keyblades swirled together, forming the humongous rainbow keyblade with a paopu-fruit charm. They slashed straight down this time, creating a vertical shockwave of combined dark and light energy, landing a direct hit on Ares. The god staggered, but survived the attack, although clearly significantly weakened. Riku started to get worried that maybe they couldn’t win, then realized that Kairi had recovered and was standing next to them.

“Ready for the Trinity attack?” Kairi asked, grinning. She held her keyblade out horizontally, and Riku did the same, resting it on top of hers. They then both looked at Sora, but the brunette signalled them to wait a second.

“I’ll destroy you!” Ares growled, starting to charge.

“Stopga!” Sora yelled, freezing the god in his tracks. That was probably the last spell Sora would be able to do for a bit, but that was okay, because it was time for their Trinity attack. If this didn’t defeat the god, nothing would.

Sora added his keyblade on top of Riku and Kairi’s, and they gathered energy between them. Then they turned, keyblades still connected but now facing Ares with a ball of energy coalesced at the tip; just as the stop spell began to wear off, they jerked their keyblades forwards. The ball of energy grew as it shot forwards, until it hit Ares, engulfing him with a giant ball of energy, darkness swirled with light, reminding one of a galaxy.

When the ball of energy dissipated, Ares fell to the ground and didn’t get up.

The stadium was completely silent for a full minute until Phil remembered to ring the buzzer. “Well, there you have it folks—if I hadn’t seen it myself, I wouldn’t believe it, but three mortals have defeated Ares, the god of war, in battle!”

After some more silence and whispers from the crowd, leaving the trio feeling slightly awkward, the crowd erupted into cheers, giving them a standing ovation as Zeus walked to the front, handing them a brilliant trophy made of some sort of crystalline material that shone different colors as it moved. Riku was positive the material couldn’t be found in the mortal realm.

Sora, Riku, and Kairi’s smiles couldn’t have been brighter as Kairi pulled out her camera from who-knew-where to snap a few photos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Mickey sends a letter to the Destiny Islands, but it never reaches its recipients! The search for the trio begins.


	8. The Search Begins

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mickey, Donald, and Goofy discover that Riku, Kairi, and Sora are not on the Islands, so set out to look for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter's so short; I promise the next one will be much longer!

Mickey Mouse paced in front of the mahogany desk in his study at Disney Castle. He had sent a bottle message to the Destiny Islands, but it had returned, indicating the intended recipients—Kairi, Riku, and Sora—were not actually on them. But where else could they be? Concerned, and needing to speak to the trio, the mouse had sent Donald and Goofy over to investigate, who should be back any moment…

“King Mickey!” came a warble, right on cue, as the aforementioned duck rushed frenziedly into the study, almost losing his hat in the process. “It’s horrible!”

“What happened?!” Mickey asked with extreme worry at Donald’s panicked reaction. Had something happened to the teens? Were they in trouble, or…?

“A-hyuk. It isn’t that bad,” Goofy said as he entered the room. “Donald’s just overreacting.”

Mickey took a deep breath. He should have expected that; Donald was always giving Mickey near-heart-attacks. “Overreacting to what?”

“I am not overreacting!” Donald squawked insistently. “They’re gone! That IS bad!”

“But Kairi’s parents said they were just travelling. Showed us some letters and a bunch of photos Kairi had sent them, too,” Goofy explained. 

“Oh, well that’s nothing to worry about, then,” Mickey said. “Did they say when they’d be back?”

“No!” Donald squawked indignantly.

Goofy provided a more thorough answer. “Well, according to Kairi’s mother, they didn’t actually give a time-frame. She seemed to think it’d be a very long while. They didn’t even re-registered for school, even though the summer break ended weeks ago.”

“I see,” Mickey said, feeling slightly uneasy. The teens were starting to sound more like runaways rather than travellers. “Then, do you know where they are?” he asked. “We can send the letter there instead.”

“Well, that’s the tricky part,” Goofy said calmly. “Wherever they went, they took the emergency GummiShip we had left them, so we know it’s off-world.”

“Exactly!” Donald interjected. “They’re out there on their own! Missing!”

“But Kairi’s parents said she was visiting her homeworld,” Goofy continued amiably, ignoring Donald’s outburst. “So if we figure out where that is, we figure out where they are!” Goofy concluded happily.

“Kairi’s parents didn’t say which world it was?” Mickey said.

“They didn’t know!” Donald said, voice angry. “Apparently, Kairi forgot to tell them, and they forgot to ask!”

“Hmmm.” Mickey looked thoughtful. They needed to find the teens asap; not just because of the importance of the message, but also because Mickey couldn’t allow three teens to wander the universe unsupervised with a state GummiShip, regardless of who the teens were. “Oh! You said she sent photos,” Mickey recalled. “Did any of them show the place?”

Donald huffed. “No. The first letter had a photo of the GummiShip interior, showing Riku and Sora, and the second was a moogle. The letter said they got there safe, and were staying with some friends, but again, not where!”

“The other letters mostly talked about some worlds they visited, like Wonderland and Christmas Town,” Goofy continued. “Kairi also mentioned she was learning how to use the keyblade! Most of the photos were random objects or close-up photos of the three of them, and there was a whole lot of writing and photos about fashion. Kairi is apparently very interested in fashion, and was trying to teach Sora about it; she had lots of photos of him dressed up. I think she also wanted Riku to, but—OW”

Donald whacked Goofy with his staff. “Mickey doesn’t want to hear about that!” he scowled. “Hmph. Point is, there was nothing we could use to discern which world their home-base is. It’s almost like it’s intentional.”

Mickey sighed, putting a hand on his head. “Why do they always have to be so difficult… We told them the ship was only for emergencies!”

“Well, I think there may have been one,” Goofy said.

“What?” Mickey turned to him, ears sharp.

“Well, we went to see Riku and Sora’s families, too, after Kairi’s—I know hers is the only family that knows about the other worlds, but we thought maybe we should see if they knew anything anyway. Riku’s folks said he left a note saying they’re leaving the Islands but not to worry, without any other information, but they didn’t seem too upset about that. Said they could tell his heart was yearning to leave again. Sora’s mother just said he wasn’t there, although instead of using his name she called him a bunch of things; I’m not sure what most of the words meant, but they sounded mean. I got the feeling that maybe they had a fight.”

“She didn’t just say he wasn’t there!” Donald yelled at Goofy. “She said he ‘wasn’t welcome there’! Get it right!”

Goofy looked confused. “But that’s the same thing.”

“No it’s not!”

Goofy turned to Mickey for guidance.

Mickey agreed with Donald. “Saying he’s not there just means he isn’t there at the moment. Saying he’s not welcome means she doesn’t want him back there again.”

“Gawsh, I’m sure she didn’t mean that,” Goofy said, surprised and still confused. “She’s his mom, after all. Sometimes people say things they don’t mean when they fight.”

Donald sighed, speaking to his friend gently despite still seeming tense, clearly used to situations like this. “Goofy, the things she said were really bad,” he told the dog. “I think she was serious.”

Goofy frowned slightly. “But she’s his mom,” he continued to argue. “Mothers don’t do that kind of thing.”

Donald and Mickey looked at Goofy in slight pity and exasperation. Looking on the bright side of things was admirable, but sometimes Goofy took it a bit too far. Should they really let him keep his hopes up on this matter? Mickey turned to Donald, silently asking his thoughts, and Donald shook his head. Mickey nodded slightly in response, agreeing with the duck that it wasn’t worth continuing trying to explain.

“Well, then, maybe you’re right,” Mickey said, smiling at Goofy. “Just, don’t mention that to Sora when you see him, okay?”

After some more discussion, Mickey decided that he, Donald, and Goofy would search for the three runaway keyblade-wielders themselves. 

As the trio entered the GummiShip hangar, they ran into Goofy’s college-age son, Max, who had just returned from somewhere.

“Oh, heya, Maxie!” Goofy cheerfully said to his son, holding his arms out for a hug.

Max rolled his eyes, ignoring the hug. “Hey, dad.”

“Aww, no hug for your father?” Goofy complained, but he didn’t seem too put-out by that; it was how Max always reacted, after all.

“Nope. Besides, I’m all sweaty and gross; I was fighting in the coliseum.”

Goofy’s eyes lit up. “Oh? How’d that go?” the dog asked, and Mickey chuckled; Goofy was always hopeful that his son would follow in his footsteps and be a knight, but to Max fighting was just something fun. Still, it was something the father-son pair could bond over, which was a good thing considering they had few shared interests.

“Ah, kinda embarrassing, actually. It was this huge four-day team tournament this time, tiered with six rounds total, but my friends and I lost in round three to some kids with those key-shaped weapons Mickey has.”

The trio froze at those words, taken entirely off-guard. 

“What? It’s not that bad,” Max said defensively. “They were really good; won the tournament even. I bet you would have lost too!”

“Oh, no, we weren’t reacting to your fight!” Goofy assured his son. “I’m sure you all did your best.”

“Yes,” Mickey confirmed. “We just happen to be missing three teenage keyblade-wielders—we’re going to look for them now actually. Could you describe them?”

Max seemed to relax at that; perhaps he cared more about his dad’s approval than he let on. “Right. Well, there were two boys, a buffer one with longer silver hair and the other scrawnier with spiky brown hair, and a girl with longer red hair. The girl seemed a bit newer at fighting; at first the other two kept defending her, which left some openings for us, though then she yelled at them for that and they stopped, which made them much tougher to fight. She seemed pretty good at healing, support, and water magic, though preferred hands-on, which was annoying as she’s really agile and kept dodging everything. The silver-haired boy also preferred close-combat, and had a lot of attacks involving fast strikes and teleporting, also very annoying. He seemed pretty good at barrier magic too.” As he explained, the trio grew excited—that description sounded like them! Until Max continued with the third one’s fighting description, upon which Donald’s excitement waned as Max said, “The brown-haired one was an expert magic-user. I’ve never fought such a powerful mage before; he was just nonstop magic, one spell after another, and powerful ones at that. After he summoned a meteor they had to briefly stop the match so Phil could tell him to tone it down and scold him about damaging the coliseum! I bet he could have beat the whole tournament single-handedly—he literally summoned a tornado. That’s what took us out. And then in the final match all three of them used some sick team combo attacks that beat the freaking God of War! They really need to introduce some sort of rank system again—having regular people fight gods and people like them really isn’t balanced at all.”

Donald sighed. “Well, that’s definitely not Sora, although the physical description matches.”

“What makes you say that?” Mickey asked. It sure sounded like Sora to him. Given, it was a bit higher-level magic than Mickey remembered the brunette having, but it’d been a couple months since they’d last seen him; maybe he had been practicing.

Donald scoffed. “He sucks at magic. I keep showing him how to do things, and he just gets confused.”

Mickey looked thoughtful. “Hmm. Well, is it possible he managed to figure it out? He does have pretty high mana reserves, if the drive forms are any indication.”

“Reserves don’t equal talent,” Donald insisted. “If Sora managed to summon a meteor, I’ll eat my hat,” 

“I dunno, Donald,” Goofy mused. “Sora does have a way of suddenly catching onto things. Maybe he just had an epi-pi-phany.”

“Epiphany,” Donald corrected, then rolled his eyes. “Come on. Even if he had, meteor is extremely high-level magic! You have to combine fire, earth, and gravity traits to get that. Sora can barely handle single-type spells.”

“Well, we don’t have any other leads, so might as well check it out, right?” Mickey suggested.

“Hold up a second,” Max interrupted. “You called him ‘Sora’? I wasn’t paying that much attention to names, since they tend to go right through my ears anyway, but I’m pretty sure the name was short and started with an S. The others were… hmm. I think the girl started with a K? And the third was also a short name too. Oh, and the announcer kept calling them ‘saviors of the universe’, although there were a lot of teams there who were called things like that. Never knew the universe had been in danger quite so many times.”

“That does sound a lot like them, Donald,” Goofy said.

“But the magic!” the duck still argued.

“Oh, right!” said Max, remembering something else. The three turned to him expectantly, wondering if it was something about the trio. “Donald, your nephews were there too, by the way.” Well, it was a trio, just the wrong one.

“Wak!” Donald screeched, stomping his foot. “I told them not to go there!”

“Well, they made it a round higher than me,” Max pointed out. “Even if they forfeited against team Sea-Salt.”

“Doesn’t matter! Ooooh, if I didn’t have to look for Sora right now…” Donald looked like he might blow a gasket.

“Wait, Sea-Salt?” Goofy noted. “Huh. That sounds familiar…”

“That’s the ice-cream flavor their nobodies and Riku used to eat a lot!” Mickey said excitedly. “It must be them!”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Leon!” Sora yelled mirthfully, upon entering the house and seeing the man sitting with a bowl of food on the blue polka-dot couch. They had returned in the evening despite having left the coliseum the previous evening; there were no wormholes between the two worlds in the proper direction that could speed things up. Sora had been extremely put-out about having to forego most the afterparty, but they’d already been gone a day longer than initially planned and Riku hadn’t wanted anyone getting too worried about where they were. So they’d stayed just long enough to be polite—the champions had to let people introduce themselves and congratulate them and whatnot, according to Phil—and then Riku insisted they leave before Sora and Kairi could consume more than one glass of wine each, which they definitely seemed inclined to.

“Hey, what’s up, kid?” Leon greeted. “How’d you do? You were gone longer than expected.”

“Yeah! We got there just in time for this huge four-day championship tournament! It was different than usual—only six rounds, but all sentient beings in teams of three so much more difficult. Apparently they’re going to have this every few months. People came from all over to see and compete! There were sixty-four teams, and a lot of them included gods and other supernatural immortal beings.”

Leon raised his eyebrows. “Gods? They had mortals fighting literal gods?” he turned to Riku for confirmation.

“Yeah,” Riku said. “I was surprised too.”

“But we won the tournament anyway!” Kairi cheered, holding up the trophy. “The final match was against Ares, the literal God of War—the crowd couldn’t believe it at first, but then they cheered so loudly!”

“All thanks to Sora’s magic,” Riku said with pride.

Sora blushed. “No, you both helped too. I couldn’t have done it without you; the Trinity attack was what ended it!”

Leon whistled. “You three finally got the Trinity attack figured out, huh? Come on, sit; I need to hear all about this!”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Ah, sorry folks, but you just missed the tournament—oh, why if it isn’t Mickey!” Phil greeted, turning around to find the mouse behind him.

“Hello, Phil. It’s been a while,” Mickey replied jovially. He knew Phil due to prior dealings with the world long ago, when he had the duty of warning worlds about darkness. He had spoken to Zeus, but decided to go see the coliseum while there and Phil had convinced him to fight a bit. “This is my royal mage and knight, Donald and Goofy respectively,” Mickey introduced.

Phil waved a hand. “Ah, yeah, I know them already. They usually appear with the spikey-haired kid,” the satyr said. “Now, what brings you here? Not to compete, I hope—this week’s tournament was a special four-day championship one, complete with festivities, and there is still a ton of clean-up to do! The regular tournaments won’t start back up for a few more days, so if you’re here to fight, you’re outta luck.”

“No, not this time,” Mickey said. “We’re looking for three runaway keybladers—”

“Ah, let me guess, Sora, Riku, and Kairi?”

“Yes, that’s them!”

“Well, then, let me tell you, what an improvement! I mean, I haven’t seen the other two fight before, but Sora? Don’t tell him this, but I think maybe he might actually deserve the title of True Hero now, with such impressive magic.” He turned to Donald. “You’re the mage of the group, right? Were you his teacher?”

Donald only looked at Phil in surprise.

Phil frowned, examining Donald with a hand on his chin. “Hmm. No, probably not; your magic wasn’t nearly on his level, from what I remember, unless you improved a lot too. I wonder who he trained with; you probably should train with them too.”

Donald now bristled with anger. “That can’t be true! Sora can’t do magic like that; he isn’t capable! He must have cheated somehow!”

Phil raised an eyebrow. “You sure lack confidence in him, huh? Well, let me tell you, that was true magic. He did things most people there had never seen before—a thunderstorm in a tornado, and a poisonous mist… maybe he just found a better teacher.”

“A better teacher?” Donald said weakly. Mickey felt bad for him; he knew Donald had tried his best at teaching Sora, and had been disappointed that he couldn’t. Mickey also sensed that the duck might be a little—well, a lot—jealous that someone else might have had more success at teaching Sora after Donald had tried so hard to.

“Well, maybe not better, but different at least,” Phil amended. “You know, sometimes the teaching method makes all the difference; I’ve seen people completely fail under some instructors, and then do amazingly with others! Of course, if they’d trained under me, they wouldn’t have had to try different instructors, but it’s whatever. Point is, you seem like a pretty stubborn guy—you gotta learn that if one way isn’t working, try something else. I bet that’s what happened. I mean, I could definitely tell he had potential the first time he visited.”

“Oh! That’s how I learned to fight!” Goofy remembered. “I almost gave up at first, but then my instructor died, so I had to get someone else.” He said this casually, as though an instructor dying was nothing. “The new one had different ways of doing things, and I caught on really quickly after that.”

Donald looked like he might faint of shock at the news that there could be different methods of teaching things.

“Anyway, back on why we’re here,” Mickey interjected, recognizing that continuing the current line of discussion was not in his subject’s best interest. He knew the duck had secretly hoped that Sora would develop his magic further, but to hear that perhaps all it took was someone else’s instruction must be very upsetting.

“Ah, yes,” Phil said. “You’re looking for those three. Well, unfortunately you won’t find them here. They left almost immediately after they won the tournament; I had to practically force them to attend at least a little of the afterparty! I mean, you can’t just vanish right after becoming the champions. Besides, who doesn’t like a good party? You know, I got the feeling that Sora and the girl actually did want to stay, but the silverette dragged them away, saying something about being underage or something—no clue what that means. Well, they missed out on some really good wine; Dionysis picked it out himself! Maybe next time they’ll stay.”

“Ah, yeah, maybe,” Mickey replied, secretly proud of Riku for being so responsible. “I wouldn’t count on that though. Anyway, we gotta go too—we really gotta find them.”

“Right. Oh, and when you do, please make sure Sora learns some restraint with that magic; whomever taught him apparently forgot to teach him responsible use. He would have killed some magic cat kid if the dog with a shield hadn’t protected him.” Phil peered at Goofy. “You know, that dog kid kinda reminds me of you. Fights the same, too. He yours?”

Goofy, confused and speechless, nodded. The description matched Max, and they knew he’d fought Sora’s group, although knowing his kid came very close to death must be nerve-wracking.

“Well, you ought to be proud! He fought extremely well. Literally blocked a meteor spell.”

“Gawrsh, he didn’t tell me that,” Goofy said, seeming proud, then concerned again. “But Sora really used a meteor spell on Maxie?”

Donald scoffed. “Eh, it was probably just a mini one.”

Phil shook his head. “Nope, definitely was a full meteor. Dented the ground and everything; thankfully Philomelus was there to fix it before the next match—he can smooth out any field.”

“Oh.” Goofy paused. “Well, I’m sure Sora knew Max would block it… What about the other battles? Max didn’t tell me that much.”

“Well, his team was surprisingly good for mortals, you know…”

Mickey smiled. They really did need to get going, but maybe he could give Goofy a little time to learn about his son, who was always so aloof from his father. Phil was right though: meteors were generally designed to kill, not incapacitate. Using them on gods was one thing, but on Goofy’s kid? It probably stemmed from being so used to fighting heartless and nobodies instead of mortal, sentient beings; they’d learned from the start to use full power when in battle, so didn’t know how to hold back during less fatal competitions. Mickey would have to talk to all three of the young wielders about that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: a quick trip to get ice cream ends up with Sora and Riku marooned in the Pride Lands; Mickey's search leads him to Radiant Garden.


	9. Pride Lands (part 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Riku and Sora want to go to Twilight Town to get ice cream, yet the GummiShip runs out of power, stranding them in the Pride Lands. Meanwhile, Mickey, Donald, and Goofy find Kairi in Radiant Garden. Upon discovering the boys never made it to Twilight Town, the four go searching for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You may have noticed the chapter count went up again. It's not as long as the Coliseum was, but the Pride Lands chapter got longer than desired (as it's two groups going there separately), so I split it too, and made part 2 include returning to Radiant Garden, which originally would have been part of the final chapter but I realized the final chapter would have also been too long in that case.
> 
> A note about time: It's (probably?) been less than half a year to Sora since he last saw Simba, but it's been a year in the Pride Lands. I wanted them interacting with Simba's kid, so I just chose an age for her that made sense for such. I assume time runs much faster in the Pride Lands than other places, as between Sora's second visit and after Xemnas's defeat Nala found the time to have a cub, which takes 3-4 months (so assuming they got busy immediately after Simba returned to the pride, it was at least that long there between when Sora first visited the world and defeating Xemnas). So either KH2 took much longer than anyone thought (is there any official word about how long it was though?), the ending Pride Lands sequence took place in the future, or the Pride Lands runs on a much faster timeline. I'm assuming it's the latter.
> 
> Of course, this complicates things further as each group arrives there at different times. Everything just got too confusing to think about and try to calculate, and if time there truly runs that much faster it means the two would be missing far longer than I wanted, so please just assume that the timeline works somehow. I tried my best; time in the KH universe is just way too confusing (even without the whole time-travel plot).

“Riku! I think the ship has something wrong with it!” Sora called from the pilot’s seat.

“Well, obviously!” Riku replied, a bit harsher than intended. The ship shook and sputtered as though it were under attack, yet nothing appeared on the radar. Riku looked around the cockpit, eyes finally landing on a certain gauge. “It looks like the fuel’s nearly empty!”

“What? This thing never runs out of fuel!”

“Probably because Donald and Goofy remember to refill it! What’s it run on? Gas?”

“Donald always insists it runs on ‘happy faces’ and forces me to smile if I’m feeling down.”

Riku raised an eyebrow. “You can’t be serious.”

Sora shrugged. “Hey, I didn’t say it. Where’s the manual for this thing? I bet that’ll tell us.”

After about five minutes of Sora still attempting to drive the near-empty ship, Riku located the manual and opened it to the page on power. “You’ve got to be kidding,” he said flatly.

“What?”

“Apparently Donald was correct,” Riku said drily. No wonder they’d lost power so rapidly; Riku had a ‘resting bitch face’ as Kairi called it, and Sora had finally been convinced to stop faking his smiles when alone with Riku or Kairi—despite his excitement about their impromptu trip, Sora was not feeling the best that day, so not much smiling had occurred.

“Huh? It wasn’t just a way to get me to feel better?”

Riku looked at Sora in confusion. “Why would that make you feel better?”

“Well, that’s what he always says when I’m sad. ‘Turn that frown upside down’ and whatnot. I didn’t realize it actually was related to the ship when we were on it.”

Riku shook his head in disbelief, not only at the power source but also at the fact that the duck thought that simply telling someone to smile would cheer them up. Riku had half a mind to confront Donald about how he treated Sora. He hadn’t liked the duck much to begin with; he’d previously assumed it was due to lingering jealousy, but now there was definitely more to it. It seemed like every time Sora mentioned Donald something was revealed about how poorly the duck treated him! How much of Sora’s penchant for hiding his emotions had stemmed from people like Donald—and probably Goofy too—telling him to smile when sad, or otherwise belittling his emotions? Emotions should be talked about, or at least acknowledged, not hidden—Riku had learned that the hard way. Plus, there was the whole thing with Donald apparently having told Sora many times that his magic sucked—maybe not exactly that phrasing, but that’s how Sora had interpreted things—which should be addressed too. Maybe Riku should send a letter to Mickey about it, see how his mouse friend would approach that.

“Well, guess we should try smiling, then,” Sora said after a bit, snapping Riku from his thoughts. “I mean, those times he said to smile and I did may have been fake smiles, but the ship did stop losing power…”

Riku scoffed. “Seriously? It can’t be that simple.”

Regardless, the two plastered fake smiles on their faces, and true to the manual, the semblances of “happy” faces did indeed stabilize the power just enough to (barely) keep the ship going. Riku didn’t even know where to start with how ridiculous that was.

Wary of the ship’s tepid power level and unsure if they could keep up the fake-smiles long enough to reach their goal, the two boys stopped at the closest world to them, which turned out to be the Pride Lands. Riku hadn’t been there before, so was quite excited at the prospect—although Kairi had been wanting to go, too, so they’d need to return here with her. 

Their actual goal for the day had been Twilight Town, because Sora had been craving sea-salt ice cream (most likely a trait inherited from Roxas, like Sora’s ridiculous skateboard skills) but Scrooge McDuck, who had previously sold it in Radiant Garden, had left to go elsewhere; it was a free day, and since Kairi was having a “girl’s day out” with Aerith and Yuffie, the boys needed something to do that Kairi wouldn’t mind not being included in, so figured today would be perfect for that. They’d promised her they’d bring her back some ice cream, which wouldn’t be a problem at all, seeing as the largest cooler Sora could find now sat in the back of the ship, ready to stock up on the ice cream. Riku may have underestimated Roxas’s—now Sora’s—obsession with that stuff.

“Kairi’s going to be pissed we went here without her!” Sora said, unbuckling the ship’s harness. “And that she won’t get ice cream.”

“I think our safety matters more to Kairi than getting ice cream,” Riku sighed. “And we can always return with her.” They’d probably have to travel with her from now on, actually, seeing as it was most likely her constant genuine smiling that kept the ship moving.

“What? But it’s ice cream! And not just any ice cream—sea salt! Riku, if I don’t get sea-salt ice cream today, I’m going to die.”

Riku rolled his eyes. “That’s a bit over-dramatic, even for you, Sora… hey, where are you going?”

Sora turned to Riku, clearly confused as to why he wasn’t following him. “Outside, duh!”

“But shouldn’t we try to contact someone?”

“How? The ship’s out of power.”

Riku turned to the control board, seeing that it was indeed fully out of power now, without even enough to power the communication systems. For some reason, there wasn’t any kind of backup power source for such—whomever created the power system must have seriously believed that running out of happiness wasn’t possible. Riku wanted to punch that person.

“Exactly!” Sora said, seeing Riku’s reaction. “Come on!” He grabbed Riku’s arm and began to drag him out of the ship.

“But, Sora—” 

“No buts! I want to see what you look like as a lion! Plus, might as well visit Simba while we’re here. Oh, and it’ll help get us happy enough to make the phone work too, probably. Being a lion is so much fun!”

Riku sighed, allowing himself to be led out of the ship. They didn’t seem to have any better options; on the surface Sora’s excitement looked happy, but Riku—and apparently the ship—could sense the underlying anxiety. Well, if a vacation from being human was what Sora needed to start feeling better, Riku could give him that much.

As soon as he stepped out of the GummiShip, Riku fell over. He tried to stand, but his arms wouldn’t—oh, right. The magic sure had changed him quickly. Riku hobbled carefully onto his feet—rather, paws—and turned towards the lion cub sitting comfortably next to him, who seemed to be grinning. It wasn’t anything like a human grin, but it was somehow Sora’s grin nonetheless. Sora was a lion cub with burnt-umber fur and tufts of a lighter brown mane—it looked almost like a mohawk, and oddly resembled Sora’s usual untameable hair—and a matching tuft of fur at the end of his tail. He had a beige muzzle, belly, and paws. Somehow, his transformation had also retained the crown necklace that Riku had given them when they were kids. Riku felt an odd sense of pride that Sora had kept it all this time, and that it was so special to him that Sora’s world-order transformations always kept it even when fully non-human.

“Wow, you look good, Riku!” Sora said. “Come on, there’s a small pool you can take a look in.” Sora bound towards a little rock-rimmed pond and waterfall; they appeared to be in some sort of oasis, one side leading to forest and the other to open savanna.

Riku looked towards where Sora had run. He made it look so effortless! Riku managed it a total of three steps before tripping over himself again, landing on his chin. “Oww…”

“Riku? You okay?” Sora hopped over to him.

“I can’t walk,” Riku muttered in frustration. “Also, I think I put a fang through my lip.”

“Oh! I forgot. We all had trouble walking when we first got here,” Sora explained. “It’s pretty easy. You have to basically… not think about it!”

“I have to… what?”

“Instincts take over,” Sora explained, circling around Riku. “Goofy tried teaching me at first, but then we were attacked, and before I knew it I was running. So, yeah. Not thinking about it works.”

Riku took a deep breath and shakily stood again. “Okay, don’t think about—ow!” Riku let out an embarrassing squeak and darted forwards, turning around to glare at Sora. “You bit my butt!”

Sora laughed. “But it worked! You walked!”

Riku blinked, sitting down as he looked around in surprise. Well. So he had. Huh. He stood up again, strolling over to the water to have a look at himself. He looked much like Sora, but with a dark grey pelt and silver tufts of mane—slightly tamer than Sora’s— and tail tip. His muzzle, belly, and paws were a lighter grey, almost white.

Riku felt something hit his butt again. A paw? He turned to see Sora crouched in a position that the lion mind recognized as wanting to play. Riku grinned, launching himself at Sora. The two chased each other and wrestled for a while; Riku vaguely noticed Sora leading them down the jungle path as they did so.

“Simba!!!” Sora suddenly yelled, and Riku turned to see Sora careening towards a very large adult male lion, gold fur with cream paws and stomach and a thick red mane. Riku nearly panicked as the lion ran up in return, and roared, but then the lion—Simba, it must be—bumped heads with Sora and pushed him over, nuzzling his stomach. Riku calmed, the lion mind recognizing it as an affectionate gesture, like how a parental figure might ruffle a child’s hair… wait, had Sora found a father-figure here, of all places? A lion? Well, it was Sora, so anything was possible, Riku supposed.

“Rawr!” Came a sound from Riku’s right, and before he could properly react something about half his size barrelled into him, knocking him over.

Riku yelled in surprise—or rather, squeaked, how embarrassing—and tried to right himself. He nearly attacked before realizing that it was a cub about half his size, beige fur with tan stomach and paws, who was now hopping back and forth in a way indicating she wanted to play too.

“Kiara!” Simba called, he and Sora now right next to the two. “We don’t attack strangers!”

“You okay?” Sora asked Riku, nudging him with his muzzle as Riku finally managed to get up. He still wasn’t used to the whole four-legs situation. Riku nuzzled him back, a lion way of saying everything was okay.

“But he’s a cub too!” the little cub, apparently named Kiara, protested. “Besides, you know his friend, right? So it’s all good!”

“No, it’s not all good,” Simba scolded. “I know Sora, yes, and this is clearly his friend, but what if that weren’t the case? You know there are competing prides out there!”

“But they’re cubs!”

“And cubs have families! Usually cubs do not stray far from their pride on their own. Next time, approach more cautiously, and stay by me if you see lions that aren’t from our own pride.”

“Yes, father,” Kiara said, lowering her head, seemingly frustrated yet submitting regardless.

“Father?!” Sora said, excitedly. “Simba, you have a daughter!”

Simba glowed with pride. “Yes! She’s mine and Nala’s!”

“And she’s so big already, too! How old are you, Kiara?”

“Eight moon cycles!” Kiara said proudly. “Papa is going to teach me how to hunt soon!”

Simba chuckled. “Not quite, Kiara. Two more moon-cycles, at minimum, then you can.”

Kiara pouted. “Hmph. Fine.” She turned towards Sora and Riku. “But you two can hunt already, right? You have to be at least one whole sun-cycle!”

Riku blinked in confusion. Moon-cycles? Sun-cycles? Did they mean months and years? They looked like older cubs because they were still teenage humans, but obviously saying their true ages wouldn’t align...

Sora seemed at a loss of what to say too.

“Two sun-cycles,” Simba supplied, probably sensing their confusion.

“Wow!” Kiara proclaimed. “Two whole sun-cycles? You’re so old!” she giggled.

“Hey!” Simba protested playfully. “If they’re old, what does that make me?”

Kiara stuck her tongue out at Simba and ran down the path a little bit.

“How old are you?” Sora blurted out.

“Sora! That’s rude!” Riku chided.

Simba tilted his head in confusion. “Why would that be rude?” he asked. Apparently adult lions did not mind saying their age. He answered Sora, “I’m four sun-cycles.” Then, he nodded towards Riku. “So, Sora, going to introduce us?”

“Oh! Right! Simba, this is Riku. Riku, this is Simba.”

“Nice to meet you,” Riku said cordially.

“Ah, so you’re Riku!” Simba said jovially. “I’ve heard so much about you!”

Riku blinked in surprise. “You have?” He should have expected that. This seemed to be a common theme with everyone Sora introduced Riku to, which apparently extended to lions.

“Yeah! You’re all Sora could talk about last time he was here. I’m glad Sora finally found you.”

If a lion could blush, Riku would have been bright red. “I-I see. Er. Yeah, I’m glad he found me too.”

Sora snickered a little in response, no doubt sensing Riku’s discomfort.

“So, where are you headed?” Simba asked next. “Is there trouble again?”

Sora shook his head. “Nothing to worry about. We just happened to be nearby, so thought we’d visit.” Riku frowned at the ease in which Sora lied. Well, technically it wasn’t quite a lie, rather a loose interpretation of the truth, but still.

“Oh! That’s perfect, then. We were just about to head back to Pride Rock.”

“Whaaaaat? Already?” Kiara complained.

“Yep. The sun is already halfway through the sky, and it’ll take us some time to get back. You don’t want to miss dinner, do you?”

Kiara perked up at the mention of food and agreed it was time to go home. She reminded Riku a lot of Sora.

Thus, they began the long journey back to Pride Rock, through lush jungle and grassy plains and dusty chasms. It really was a beautiful world, untouched by human civilization as it was.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Mickey sighed as he strolled through the shadowy night time streets of Radiant Garden. The trio had stopped back at the Destiny Islands first, to look at the photos again in hopes of finding a clue; it did help, as the architecture hinted at a more modern, civilized world, but that still didn’t rule much out. Then Donald accidentally steered the GummiShip into the wrong warp hole, which delayed their journey by days. They had arrived near Traverse Town, so figured they’d check it as most travellers without a proper home stayed there, but as expected that had been a major bust. Mickey then realized that Yen Sid would be incredibly annoyed that it was taking him so long to contact the teens—it’d been ten days at that point since the letter had been returned—so they’d stopped at the Mysterious Tower to explain what was going on. Yen Sid was as stoic as ever, so Mickey had no idea how the old wizard felt about it.

Regardless, to expedite things the three then decided to separate to cover more ground. Since Donald and Goofy didn’t have a keyblade like Mickey did, Mickey wanted them to travel together. So they’d returned to Disney Castle for another GummiShip, after which Donald and Goofy had gone to Twilight Town to check there, as it was a place familiar to the three teens (well, for Sora and Kairi it was their Nobodies who had been the ones with ties to there, but theoretically the feelings could have carried over). Mickey decided to check Radiant Garden, as he remembered Sora had been friends with some of the people there, all of whom conveniently lived with Merlin and whom Mickey knew. If the three teens had gone travelling, that would certainly be one of their first choices. 

Finally Mickey reached his destination: a house that appeared extremely misplaced amongst the more plain stone houses. As he approached, the paint job shifted from a neon-pink to pale blue with purple abstract cloud-like designs. As Mickey reached to pull on the tasseled rope that activated the doorbell, the rope dodged away and the door opened.

“Oh, so wonderful for you to stop by!” Merlin greeted happily. “Come in, come in!”

“It’s good to see ya too, Merlin!” Mickey said cheerily. “Sorry for the late hour.” It had ended up being nearly ten at night. 

“Oh, please, no one in this house goes to bed before midnight, at the earliest. What brings you here today?” Merlin asked.

“Well—oh! Kairi!” Mickey spotted the redheaded keyblade wielder huddled around the coffee table with Aerith, Yuffie, and Tifa, playing some sort of board game involving 3D plastic contraptions.

“Oho, do you want to play too?” Merlin asked. “Such a fun game, although I seem to be dreadful at it. It’s called… oh, what was it now… something about capturing rats...”

“Thanks, but no. I’m actually here looking for Kairi, Riku, and Sora,” Mickey explained, walking over to the girl, who had stood up. “Kairi, we tried sending a message to the Islands; what a surprise it was to find none of you there and the ship missing!”

Kairi blinked at Mickey in confusion. “I thought Sora sent you a message? He said he would, at least…”

Yuffie hopped into the conversation. “He probably forgot. You know him.”

“Well, I suppose that’s true,” Mickey said, noting to speak to Sora about responsibility later. “Speaking of Sora, where is he? Riku, too?”

“They went to get ice cream in Twilight Town,” Kairi told him.

Tifa frowned. “Actually, come to think of it, they should have been back hours ago.”

Kairi shrugged. “They probably got distracted with something else. You know how Sora is.”

“But Riku is usually pretty responsible,” Mickey argued.

“Oh, you haven’t seen him around Sora, then. As soon as Sora pulls out the puppy-dog eyes, Riku bends to his will.”

Mickey blinked in surprise. “Huh. Well, I sent Donald and Goofy there to look, so hopefully they found them.” He pulled a metal box-like thing with a screen from his pocket. It was clunky, but that didn’t matter compared to how useful it was.

“What’s that?” Cid, who had just entered the house smelling like cigarettes, asked.

“This is something Chip and Dale have been working on,” the mouse explained. “It’s a portable video phone.”

“Oh, so like the ones on the ship computers, but tiny?” 

“Exactly! This is just a prototype, so it doesn’t look too great since right now they’re only testing the functionality. But it won’t be long until it’s completed fully! They wanted an easier way to keep everyone in contact; I’m sure they’ll be wanting to leave one here, too, or at least modify your computer to communicate with the phones instead of just ships. Probably both.”

Cid’s eyes were bright with excitement. “Amazing! Well, let’s see how it works, then!”

Mickey pressed a few buttons on the GummiPhone. A dull tone emitted from it for a bit, followed by Donald’s voice and a somewhat fuzzy image. Mickey explained that the final version would be clearer, but they’d used a lower-quality screen for this one as it was just to test it.

“So, I found Kairi,” Mickey explained with a smile, and Donald and Goofy exclaimed with joy.

Then Donald looked confused. “Wait, only her? Not Sora and Riku?”

Mickey nodded. “Yup. That’s where you come in—Sora and Riku supposedly went to Twilight Town earlier, but they haven’t returned yet.”

“Probably just dicking off somewhere,” Cid grumbled.

Goofy replied. “Well, we’ve been here for a few hours and haven’t seen any sign of them. We’ve asked lots of people too, including those kids Sora knows, but no one has seen any sign of them.

Mickey frowned. “That’s not good. They should have been back by now… well, I suppose you ought to head here now, we’ll wait for them a bit and then decide what to do if they don’t show up.”

The door opened, and everyone looked towards it expectantly, hoping to see the boys...

“Oh, it’s just you,” Cid grumbled.

“Well hello to you too,” said Leon. Cloud was with him too.

The group explained to the two what was going on.

“Huh. Think something happened to them?” Leon wondered.

“Nah, they’re probably just making out somewhere,” Cid said, rolling his eyes, then at the silence in the room said, “What? We’re all thinkin’ it. Except the bird and dog apparently,” he added, noting the expressions of surprise on the two; the phone had been propped up on a table so everyone could view it.

Kairi shook her head. “Even if they were—which I doubt, considering how oblivious they both are to emotions, even if the tension is obvious to everyone else—they wouldn’t be back this late because of it.” Everyone else in the room agreed except Donald and Goofy, who still appeared shocked, looking like they were internally reviewing every previous interaction between the two boys and what Sora had ever said about Riku.

“Maybe you could try calling the ship,” Leon suggested to Cid. 

Cid smacked his hand on his forehead. “Of course. Shoulda thought of that myself.” He hurried to the computer in the corner of the room, opening the call application and dialing up the GummiShip. A message popped up stating that the desired ship’s communications center was offline. “Great, they broke it,” Cid grumbled.

“Maybe they crashed the ship,” Cloud suggested. There might have been some worry behind the stoic demeanor, but Mickey couldn’t tell.

“Oh gosh, I hope not,” Mickey said, growing even more worried. He suddenly wished he’d allowed Chip and Dale to install tracking devices on the castle ships; at the time it seemed like an invasion of privacy, but now he realized that maybe in cases like this such was welcome. Although, they did have ways of tracking the status of ships remotely, to help people repair it when they crashed; perhaps they could check that. It wouldn’t tell them where the boys were, but it would tell them if the ship were disabled. Mickey told them the idea.

Cid nodded. “I’ll—ack!”

A puff of smoke covered the room, revealing Merlin, Donald, and Goofy, to everyone’s surprise.

“Hello there!” Merlin said joyfully. “Nice to see you all! I was in Twilight Town enjoying the new Bistrot when I saw these two, and happened to overhear their call to you when I went to say hello. As I was on my way back anyway, I decided to bring them!”

Mickey was about to say something about how Merlin had just been in the house with them moments before, then he remembered that Merlin was extremely liberal with the use of his unique brand of time-hopping magic.

“Oh! Can you bring Sora and Riku back like that, too?” Kairi asked hopefully.

Merlin shook his head. “For that, I’d need to know exactly where they are. My magic is for travelling to locations, not to people. Oh, and speaking of Sora, have you seen his magic? Simply wonderful! Donald, you should be honored to have trained such an amazing mage!”

Donald blinked in surprise. “So you’re the one who’s been teaching him?” the duck asked.

“Why, yes! Such a brilliant pupil,” Merlin gushed. “Took him only a single evening to learn a meteor spell! Of course he fainted, but after some practice he stopped doing that. Oh, and his transformation magic is impeccable! That’s why I decided to make him my official full-time apprentice: he changed Riku back from a bird without any practice! He just remembered seeing someone do the spell, so did it. He can change into a cat already, you know. A cat! It took me forever to manage a mammal, let alone a quadruped, but that was the first thing he changed into! Straight to a cat, didn’t even try something smaller. Yet, he still has trouble with the simpler things, oddly enough; you should have seen his jellyfish, that was… well, interesting, to say the least. I think he changed into some sort of mini eldritch horror.”

The duck stood with his jaws agape as Merlin said all this. After, he managed weekly, “transformation magic…?” That was something very few mages ever succeeded in (with the exception of world-order spells), and apparently Sora had managed it within a week. Mickey nearly had his mouth open in surprise too. Mickey knew the magical potential was there, but Donald had always told him that Sora would never learn more than the basics and Mickey had taken his word on that. 

“Hey, everyone!” the squeaky voices of Chip and Dale emitted from the computer in the corner of the room. Cid had called them up once he’d realized it had just been Merlin returning. 

Everyone gathered around the computer as Cid explained the situation.

“Well, we can’t tell the location, but we certainly can tell you if there were any issues!” Dale said, while Chip typed something on his computer.

“Got it!” Chip said. “Let’s see… hmm. No issues so far… oh!” Chip frowned, slightly confused. “That’s odd. It seems like they ran out of power.”

Cid looked at the screen, processing things. “Wait… the ships from Disney Castle, don’t they run on…”

“Happy faces, yes!” Dale said chipperly.

Cid, Kairi, and Leon all swore, to Mickey’s total surprise. Clearly something was going on here… Mickey had a bad feeling about this. Could whatever caused Sora’s mother to kick him out be affecting him that significantly?

“Then how could they run out of fuel?” Donald asked, clearly confused.

“Perhaps the ship had a leak,” Goofy suggested, even though that was literally impossible.

Leon was now glaring at Cid. “Why didn’t you think to mention this before?” he hissed, voice dangerous.

Cid put his hands up. “Hey, it’s not my fault they use such a faulty power source!”

“Hey!” Chip protested from the computer. “Happy faces are a much cleaner and safer power source than the fuel your ships use!”

“Yeah, but at least my fuel is reliable!” Cid argued. “Your ‘happy faces’ fuel just stranded two keybladers somewhere, and we have no idea where!”

“But, it’s Sora,” Donald said, still confused, no doubt under the impression that the almost-always-smiling Sora would never not be able to conjure a happy enough smile.

Leon sighed. “I really did think he was getting better. But even so, if I’d known it runs on THAT…”

“He is overall, I think,” Kairi chipped in, “But today was a bad one. That’s why Riku agreed to go with him for sea-salt ice cream.”

“I should have sent ‘em on one of my ships,” Cid said ruefully. “Instead, I let the depressed kid and the one with a resting bitch face take a ship whose fuel source is happy faces. It’d have been a sheer miracle if they hadn’t crashed.”

Yuffie laughed at that. “Cid, you have a resting bitch face, too. And so does Leon, and Cloud, and—”

“Okay, that’s enough,” Leon said. “So. We know the issue. Now we need to figure out where they are and how to help them.”

“Agreed,” Mickey concurred. He was awfully worried about what could possibly cause Sora so much pain that the ship ran out of fuel, but now was not the time to dwell on this. First they had to get him and Riku back in one piece.

“Just wait one moment!” Donald yelled, apparently thinking the opposite. “What do you mean, ‘depressed kid’?”

“Yeah, Sora’s always smiling,” Goofy said innocently.

Cid frowned. “Ya know, just cuz someone’s smiling doesn’t mean they’re happy.”

Goofy looked completely baffled at that statement. Mickey pitied the dog at times like this.

Donald turned to Kairi. “What’s going on with Sora?!” he demanded.

Kairi frowned slightly. “I don’t think it’s my place to tell. Let’s just get working on finding them, okay?”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku and Sora, as well as Kiara, were fairly tired upon reaching Pride Rock, but Simba hadn’t seemed to have broken a sweat. Why did they have to be cubs again? Once there, Simba introduced them to the pride—some recognized Sora as the hero who had saved them, although were a little confused about his age. Simba simply told him Sora and Riku were special lions and left it at that.

Dinner turned out to be raw antelope. Riku was a little disgusted at first, but Sora told him to just give into the instincts of the lion and it would be fine. And it was. It was fine, Riku told himself. Fine that he was ripping raw antelope meat off the bone with his teeth, fine that he liked the taste, fine that he wanted to keep eating it… Sora hadn’t told Riku about this part of being a lion!

“Huh. Who knew raw antelope would taste so good,” Sora commented privately to Riku afterwards.

“Oh, you mean you haven’t eaten it before?” Riku teased, then paused. “Actually, have you? Did you eat when you were here last?”

Sora put a paw behind his head in a familiar gesture. “Well, not exactly. Donald and Goofy are a bird and turtle, so weren’t very keen on that kind of food. I tried catching a bird when I was hungry, but Donald was extremely opposed to that and made me release it after using ‘cure’…”

Riku chuckled. “I wonder why.”

Sora laughed as well. “Yeah, not my brightest move. But then we met the warthog and meerkat who raised Simba, and they showed us these large grubs they eat that tasted pretty good!”

“...Grubs?”

“Yup. Apparently they’re fine for lions, because Simba ate them for years and didn’t die.”

“Right…” Riku let out a large yawn, which led to Sora yawning too. The sun had gone down while they were all eating.

“Bedtime, huh?” Simba asked, walking up to them. “Well, plenty of room in the den, or on the rock if you prefer being outside. Take your pick of spots.”

Riku turned to look at Sora. “Where would you prefer to sleep?”

Sora tilted his head in thought. “Hmmm… den,” he decided, walking into it. Riku followed him.

Riku found a spot along the side of the den to curl up, walking in a tight circle a few times before flopping down. He wasn’t sure why he did that, but it came instinctively; vaguely he remembered watching a cat at a relative’s place long ago do that, too. Maybe it was to inspect the ground for rocks or something.

Sora, on the other hand—and as expected—plopped right down next to Riku, paying no attention to the ground. Probably because he was mostly on top of Riku, arm already slung right over him. Sora nuzzled Riku’s cheek as he got comfortable, and their tails tangled together.

Simba strolled over to them, making sure they were comfortable. “You two make good mates,” he said. Riku was immensely glad that lions couldn’t blush, as if he were human he’d be bright red.

“Mhmm. We’re best mates,” Sora said sleepily, clearly misinterpreting the word. Simba smiled and went to check on his daughter before he went to sleep as well.

“Hey. You do know Simba didn’t mean friends,” Riku said to Sora quietly.

“He didn’t?” Sora seemed to be right on the edge of sleep.

“Er. No. He meant mates as in… er…” Riku wasn’t sure how to explain without it being too awkward. “Life partners.” Hopefully Sora would understand what he actually meant. Sora must have heard the word in such a context before; maybe it was the sleepiness that caused him to forget it.

“Oh… okay, we can be that too,” Sora muttered, his voice so slurred with sleep that Riku nearly didn’t catch what he’d said.

Riku turned to look at Sora, trying to think how to respond, but the brunette seemed to have fallen asleep right after saying those words. Had the brunette truly meant that? Riku wondered if he should mention it in the morning; Sora probably wouldn’t remember it though. Riku then drifted to sleep too.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Meanwhile, Mickey, Donald, Goofy, and Kairi were searching the worlds in-between Twilight Town and Radiant Garden. Cid had configured some doohickey that could tell if a GummiShip was nearby, but they still had to land on each world to tell. Cid was adamant that they use one of his ships, to Mickey’s chagrin, even though they assured him that they were sufficiently full of enough actually-happy smiles to keep a ship moving. So he purposely disabled their happiness-driven ship. Cid had grumbled something about being able to trace ion trails if they got lost or crashed, before warning them that if they got even a scratch on the ship he’d kill them himself.

“Garwsh, it looks like we have a signal!” Goofy said after only the third world on their path; the fuel situation must have been more dire than they’d thought. 

It appeared to be near-dawn on the world; seeing Kairi yawn as she woke from a quick nap, Mickey was reminded that none of them had gotten much, if any, sleep, so took out a tin of caffeinated mints and passed some to everyone. It had become a habit to carry such around, as a major downside to world travelling was a very confused sleep schedule that didn’t always align with whatever world he was in.

“Where is this?” Mickey asked. “I don’t think I’ve been here before.” It looked like a large savannah with a humongous triangular rock in the center. Quite beautiful, though there was a clear lack of civilization.

“The Pride Lands!” Donald said. Mickey recalled him talking about how he’d gone there with Sora; some sort of predator animal ruled there, though Mickey couldn’t recall which.

“Oh!” Kairi’s eyes lit up. “The place where you get to be lions! Sora told me about this! Oooh, I’ve really been wanting to see it! Of course, this isn’t the ideal situation…”

Mickey nodded. “Right. Let’s get looking, then.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku woke up extremely disoriented. His body was completely contorted: both his left hip and right shoulder were somehow on the floor while their counterpoints were pointed towards the ceiling. A human torso simply couldn’t twist like that, with the exception of master contortionists, and he was pretty sure he was not a master contortionist. He whacked his tail against the ground and set his ears back in confusion… wait. Tail? Ears? Oooooh. Right. He was currently a lion. So… technically a master contortionist? Riku’s sleep-groggy mind was somehow proud of that. 

In addition to his strange contortion, something was covering Riku—or should he say, someone. Two someones, actually. Sora, predictably, was one, completely draped horizontally over Riku’s twisted abdomen like a blanket; the other was Kiara, cuddled partly under Sora and resting her head on Riku’s leg.

“Guess I’m not getting up anytime soon,” Riku mumbled, though he didn’t really feel like rising anyway.

A quiet laugh sounded above him, and Riku twisted slightly to be more on his back as he tilted his head back to see an upside-down Simba gazing fondly at the three. Riku got the sense that the older lion saw Sora as his cub as much as he did Kiara. Possibly him, too. Actually, didn’t lions care for their cubs as a group, treating all cubs as their own? Riku thought he remembered reading that once. But Simba did know they weren’t true lions, according to Sora. Which was probably good, because otherwise Sora not aging nearly as fast as most cubs would be suspicious, presumably.

“Kiara really enjoys having you two around,” Simba commented. “It’s good for her; there aren’t many cubs around here that are her age, so she gets lonely. She tries to play with the older ones, but… well, you know how it is.”

“Yeah,” Riku agreed, though he couldn’t really say he had much experience with the dynamics of lion cub play hierarchies. “We can come back again, if you want,” he offered. “I’m not sure how frequent it’ll be, and you’ve obviously noticed we age differently, but we’ll try to stop by whenever we have time.”

Simba practically glowed at that. “Really? Thank you so much! She’ll definitely love that!”

“We’ll bring our friend Kairi, too,” Sora said, apparently awake now. “She’s been really wanting to visit here.”

“You’re not leaving yet, are you?” Kiara mumbled, waking too. Neither she nor Sora moved off of Riku.

“Of course not!” Sora told her.

“Ah, well…” Riku was lost. They really did need to at least let someone know they were here, but Riku could hardly say he wasn’t enjoying this.

“Please, Riku?” Sora begged, somehow managing his signature puppy-dog eyes despite being a lion.

Kiara copied that expression perfectly, and Riku had no choice but to cave.

“Okay, fine. We’ll stay one more night,” Riku said, though the faces actually hadn’t been necessary for him to agree.

“Yay!” Both Sora and Kiara cheered, leaping up, which apparently somehow entailed propelling off of Riku’s stomach.

“Owwww…” Riku moaned, and Sora came over to lick his stomach in comfort.

“Sorry,” Sora said, and if a lion could blush, Sora definitely was doing such. 

Riku chuckled. “S’fine,” he mumbled, rolling over and immediately tensing all his muscles. He bounded at Sora, pinning him to the ground and licking behind his ear.

“Riku!” Sora laughed.

“I want to play, too!” Kiara cheered, leaping on top of them to complete the pile. Both Riku and Sora had their breaths knocked out of them; how could one tiny cub create so much force?

Eventually Simba jumped into the play-wrestling session too, which soon after turned into a group grooming session. Which was weird. But they were lions, so it wasn’t really that weird—in fact, it actually felt quite nice. Riku decided not to think about it so much, relaxing and letting the lion take control.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the idea for Sora learning a larger transformation spell before simpler ones based on my own experiences with learning physical skills; I often end up getting more complex things while taking forever with the simpler ones (for example, when learning a simple beginner's weave with poi, I just couldn't get it, then when I thought I had it turned out I had ended up figuring out the more complex version first, which to me felt easier). I thought it'd be neat if Sora had that quirk too.
> 
>   
> Next up: Mickey et. al. look for Sora and Riku in the Pride Lands while the two boys spend time with Kiara. Then, after being reunited, Sora, Kairi, and Riku finally figure out their feelings.


	10. Pride Lands (part 2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Riku and Sora spend time with Kiara while Mickey and co. look for the boys. Once reunited, Riku, Sora, and Kairi resolve the feelings that have been brewing. Finally, they return to Radiant Garden, where conversations are had.

“Well, here’s their ship,” Goofy said, in the form of a tortoise-dog thing, pointing out the obvious.

“But not them.” Donald too pointed out the obvious. Mickey didn’t know why the world magic hadn’t simply kept the duck in his normal form; the flying bird wasn’t so different, except that it could actually fly of course. 

A small growl of annoyance came from Kairi, in the form of a red-ochre lion cub with a pinkish belly along with black-tipped ears, tail, and paws. Apparently all humans became lions here.

“Well, let’s see if we can figure out where they went,” Mickey said with a sigh; hadn’t the boys been taught that if you’re lost and need rescuing, stay put? Mickey’s form was that of what Kairi had identified as a mongoose, though his regular black coloration had been retained.

“I think… they went this way…” Kairi said, sniffing the ground.

“You can tell?” Goofy asked in wonder.

Kairi looked at him unimpressed. “You’ve been here with Sora multiple times, yet are unaware how well-developed a lion’s sense of smell is?”

“Uh. I wasn’t really payin’ attention to that kinda thing.”

“Well, it’s strong. Enough to tell that Donald is standing where one of them peed.” She walked over to the spot the duck had immediately vacated, sniffing the ground. “Scratch that. Both of them.” She stood up and rolled her eyes. “Ugh. Boys.”

Mickey chuckled, which came out as a strange chirp in the mongoose form.

“I can’t believe you really smelled that,” Goofy said in wonder, as they headed along the scent trail. 

Kairi snickered. “I’m a lion. Smelling pee for information is part of the deal. Can’t allow the human part of me to be queasy about it, can I? You have to let the instincts loose.” Mickey realized that that must have been how Kairi had mastered walking nearly immediately whereas he had taken some time to figure it out.

“Just don’t let too many of those instincts loose!” Donald warned. “Don’t want you accidentally eating one of us!”

Kairi playfully snapped her jaws near Donald, who jumped away with an indignant squawk. “Oops,” she said, a tail feather in her grin.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Riku, Sora, and Kiara stood at the highest point of Pride Rock, the little princess telling the two keyblade-wielders all about Simba’s—and eventually, her—Kingdom. Riku had to admit, it was quite beautiful, with all its lush green meadows and forests and whatnot. A world untouched by human civilization, where no human had ever even set foot (not counting them, as technically they weren’t human right now).

“Everything the light touches is our Kingdom,” Kiara informed them.

“Everything in total, or just what you can see from here?” Sora asked.

The princess scrunched her nose in confusion for a moment. “Ummm. Just from here, I think.”

“What about that shadowy place over there?” Riku gestured to a far corner that the light seemed to avoid.

“Oh, that’s… well, Papa says not to go there, but I don’t exactly know what it is.”

“Oh, I’ve been there!” Sora proclaimed.

“Really?!” Kirara perked up. “What’s it like? Can you take me?”

“Oh, um…” Sora began, and Riku really hoped he’d tell the cub no. The last thing they needed was to be leading Simba’s daughter somewhere he’d strictly told her not to go. “No, I don’t think your Papa would like that very much.” Riku let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. “Besides, it’s pretty scary there.” Sora finished.

“Scary? I’m not scared of anything!” Kiara puffed up her chest in an adorable attempt to look fearsome.

Sora shook his head. “It’s not a matter of being scared or not. It’s a dangerous place.”

Kiara pouted. “Boooo. Can you at least tell me why? Papa won’t tell me why!”

“Ah, well, I almost got eaten by hyenas when I went there, so, that’s probably why.”

Kiara’s eyes widened. “Hyenas?”

Sora nodded. “Yup. They are not something you want to mess with!”

Kiara regained her composure, trying to hide the bit of fear she’d shown at the mention of hyenas. “I agree. It is not a place you should ever go.”

“So, what do you want to do now?” Riku asked the two (because even though technically it was he and Sora watching over Kiara, in practice it was Riku watching over Sora and Kiara).

Kiara looked out at the landscape. “Oh!” She gestured to a spot with lots of boulders, bushes, and trees. Riku vaguely remembered passing along the edge of it while they had walked here from the ship. “It’s the perfect place for hide-and-seek!”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“I lost their scent.” Kairi said flatly, stopping shortly after they exited the forest and entered a flat plain. “It’s too dry here, and the wind is in the wrong direction.”

“Perhaps I can be of some help, hmm?” 

The group turned towards the voice, Mickey and Kairi pulling out their keyblades.

“Oh, no need to be scared of ol’ Rafiki,” said an elderly monkey. He was thin, with blue and white fur, carrying a walking stick adorned with a couple of gourds tied around the top.

Mickey withdrew his keyblade and signaled everyone else to do the same. He sensed there was no need to worry.

“Hmmmm.” The monkey peered at each in turn, face coming uncomfortably close. “You are looking for the two keyblade-wielding cubs, are you not?”

Mickey gave a start. “How do you know?”

The monkey laughed. “Well, it’s not every day we get people from other worlds, let alone two groups!” Mickey blinked in surprise; he hadn’t expected someone in such an uncivilized world to know about the other worlds.

“Do you know where they are?” Donald asked excitedly.

“Hmmmm. And why would you need to know that?” Rafiki asked. Mickey got the sense that he was toying with them.

“Well, we think they may be in trouble,” Goofy supplied.

Rafiki smiled. “Well, then, good news! They seem to be doing just fine. Simba introduced them to the princess, who absolutely adores the two!”

“Princess?” Kairi squeaked. Mickey suspected there might have been a touch of jealousy there.

“Oh, don’t you worry, she’s not going to steal them away,” Rafiki told the lioness. “Kiara is much too young for mating! She can’t even hunt yet.”

Kairi sat down, looking surprised. “Mating? What?”

The monkey chuckled again, and gestured towards a huge triangular array of rock far off in the distance, close to the horizon. “Yesterday I saw them heading towards Pride Rock with King Simba and Princess Kiara. Now, ol’ Rafiki has things to do.” The monkey ambled away, humming a strange tune.

The group began heading towards their destination, happy that it was early morning—it would take a while to travel such a long distance, especially as the terrain looked like it was getting a little rougher. Large rocks, bushes, and trees scattered the landscape; it was impossible to go in a straight line, so they relied on Donald being able to fly up periodically and reorient them if they began veering in the wrong direction.

Soon, as the rocks began to lessen, allowing them to walk around them, the four came across a tiny sandy-colored lion cub. At first Mickey wondered if it was one of theirs, but then realized that the cub was probably much too young for that, and female. She was faced away from them, looking around the corner of a bush.

“Hello. Who are you?” Mickey asked the cub. 

The cub jumped in the air with a squeak, spinning around. “Who are you?” She growled, although shakily.

“Gosh, I didn’t mean to scare ya!” Mickey hurriedly explained. “We’re just passing by, that’s all.”

“Well, then, shhhhh!” The cub whispered. “I’m playing hide-and-seek with papa’s friend and his mate!” She inched around the bush, darting forward with the goal of getting behind a boulder further ahead.

A silver cub intercepted the smaller one. This one was older, about twice the size of the female cub, with the beginnings of a mane. “Gotcha!” he declared, and the smaller cub let out a squeal of delight as he pinned her to the ground via a paw on her stomach. Then, he realized they weren’t alone. The silver cub stiffened, pushed the little one behind him, and took a defensive stance over her, teeth bared. He growled in warning.

It would actually have been cute, Mickey thought, if he weren’t currently in the form of a prey animal.

Kairi gasped. “Riku?”

The silver cub retained the defensive position, though stopped growling, opting for a suspicious glare instead.

“Riku, it’s us,” Mickey said, trusting Kairi’s recognition (she’d instantly known it had been him in Ansem’s body, after all, so it wasn’t a stretch that she’d easily recognize him as a lion too).

Mickey could see the realization hit Riku. “Kairi?” He stared at Mickey for a bit longer before figuring it out. “...Mickey?”

“And Goofy and Donald!” the dog-turtle said happily.

Riku relaxed, looking embarrassed. At least, Mickey thought it was embarrassment. Lions didn’t really blush. “Sorry about the growl,” Riku said. “I just wasn’t expect—”

Riku was cut off as he was barrelled over by a darker cub. The two rolled around a bit in struggle until the new one had Riku pinned down.

“Hey! You’re supposed to be hiding!” the little cub complained.

“I heard you make a threatening growl, so came to rescue you two,” Sora explained.

“Then why did you tackle ME?” Riku wondered.

“Umm… I got distracted?” Sora said in the form of a question, and Riku rolled his eyes.

“Sora?” Kairi asked.

Sora turned to look at her, Riku still pinned down. “Oh, hi, Kairi! You make a cute cub.”

Riku growled slightly. “Sora, could you get off of me?”

Sora looked down at Riku. “Oh, right. Sorry.”

“I want to wrestle too!” the tiny cub called, tackling Sora and Riku before they could move. 

“Kiara!” Sora laughed, giving the cub’s forehead a lick. 

“We can wrestle later,” Riku said from the bottom of the pile. “I’m pretty sure our friends want an explanation.”

“Okay, you explain it, then,” Sora told Riku, rolling off of him and taking Kiara with him. The two leapt away and began to play-fight.

Mickey watched the whole display in slight confusion. Well, they had found Sora and Riku, at least. The cub must be the princess that monkey had been talking about. But there didn’t seem to be any adult lions around. Were the two boys babysitting her?

Riku walked over to the group of miscellaneous animals and sat down. “Hey,” he said. “So, uh, guess you came looking for us, huh?”

“Of course we came looking for you!” Kairi growled in… upset? Annoyance? Relief? Exasperation? Mickey couldn’t quite tell the tone. Riku seemed to understand though, being more familiar with lion tones and expressions as he was one himself. “You were supposed to return last night!”

Riku simply looked confused. “Uh. I appreciate the concern, but Sora and I aren’t exactly ones for timeliness, you know that. I expected you to at least wait until morning to wonder where we were, and time moves faster here than Radiant Garden; that’s one reason we stayed overnight with the lions… and why did you call in Mickey?”

“Oh, she didn’t call us,” Mickey said. “We came looking for all three of you.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

It had taken nearly a half hour—at least, as far as Riku could judge based on the sun’s location, which he admittingly wasn’t very good at reading—to get (almost) everyone caught up with each other. Sora and Kiara had tired each other out somewhere during Riku’s conversation with the others, and were now collapsed under a small acacia tree taking a nap. They looked so adorable curled up against each other! They really could be siblings, Riku thought. 

“So, you still haven’t told us why you left the Destiny Islands in the first place,” Donald pointed out. Again. Ugh.

“As I told you earlier, it’s not my place to say,” Riku said with as much patience as he could muster. The duck really got on his nerves! 

“Then who’s place is it?”

“Well,” Goofy said, “Kairi said that too, so by process of elim-in-in-ation”—the dog struggled over the word’s pronunciation—“the one we need to ask is Sora, right?”

“Right! SORA!” the duck—rather, tropical bird—yelled, starting to waddle towards the sleeping cub.

Riku’s anger spiked at that. Did Donald have any tact? You can’t just wake someone and ask them uncomfortable questions! He roared—well, as best a roar as a cub could manage, which was more like a loud squeak—and leapt in front of Donald, teeth bared. He growled in warning.

“Wak!” Donald jumped back in shock.

“Riku!” Mickey admonished.

Riku stood firm. “Let him sleep. He can tell you later—but only if he wants to. If you try to force it out of him…” Riku let the threat hang.

Donald tried protesting. “But—”

“I agree,” Mickey interrupted. “Donald, let it go for now.”

Riku felt Kiara brush up against him and yawn. He glanced behind him to where Sora had been sleeping… only to find he wasn’t there. “Kiara. Where’s Sora?” he asked, trying not to panic.

“Hmm?” the cub mumbled sleepily. “Uhhh. I think your mate said he was gonna get a drink of water or something? I dunno, I wasn’t paying much attention.”

“Did he hear what we were saying?”

“Maybe? I fell asleep, but I think he was mostly awake. He was definitely awake when I woke up to that bird yelling.” Kiara looked contemplative. “Why are you talking to a bird, anyway? You don’t seem to get along.”

“Er. Well. That’s…”

“You should just eat him,” the cub suggested casually, with an expression suggesting she wasn’t actually serious. “I’m pretty hungry after all that play, so I’m sure you are too…” Riku caught on to what she was playing at.

Riku glanced towards Donald, who was slowly backing up, and slyly bared his teeth. “Hmm. That is a pretty tempting idea…” He began prowling towards the duck along with Kiara.

Kairi also caught on. “You know, I’m a little hungry too,” she said, approaching the bird in a low crouch from the other side.

“Okay okay I get it!” Donald squawked, covering his head with his wings.

Kairi and Kiara giggled and Riku grinned. Then he remembered why he’d been angry at the duck in the first place. “I’m going to find Sora,” he told the group. “Kiara, you stay here, they’ll watch you.” Riku paused, turning to Kairi. “Er. That is okay, right?”

Kairi laughed. “Don’t worry, we’ll take good care of her,” she promised, and Riku ran off to find Sora.

Sora said he wanted water, right? Riku knew that was just an excuse to get away from everyone, but hopefully Sora would have followed through on the excuse and gone to the nearby stream, actually thirsty or not. Why did that duck have to say anything? Sora had been expressly avoiding the subject of why they’d left, and now the duck was going on yelling about how he wanted answers. So of course Sora would run. Of course. Riku knew Sora wouldn’t go far, but Riku still couldn’t help but worry.

Thankfully, Riku did find Sora at the stream, although he wasn’t immediately visible. Sora was lying mostly under a bush on the edge of the water, looking down and with a paw trailing in the water. He watched Riku as he approached, the only path to him being along the water’s edge. Sora swatted the water when Riku got close, splashing him in the face.

“Hey, what was that for?” Riku complained, though he wasn’t actually upset.

Sora only grinned in response, as Riku scooted in beside Sora, nuzzling close to him.

“So… you know hide-and-seek is over, right?” Riku asked playfully.

“Who says I’m hiding?”

“Oh? So you’re not? Because this definitely looks like a hiding spot to me.”

Sora shuffled slightly. “Well… okay, maybe I am hiding. Just a little.”

“You know, you can’t hide from it forever.” 

The two fell into silence, Riku waiting for Sora’s answer. How things played out now would be completely up to the brunette.

“...I know,” Sora finally said, voice quiet as he stared into the water.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Kairi,” Mickey said sternly, catching the girl’s attention by surprise; she’d been staring in the direction Riku had run off in. Kiara was busy chasing Donald while Goofy cheered her on, so Mickey figured now was a good time to talk. “Look, I know you and Riku are trying to protect Sora on your own, but it’s okay to ask for help, you know.”

“Oh. Um…” Kairi shuffled slightly, looking nervous. “That’s okay, we’re fine. Sora’s fine.”

Mickey looked at her, completely unfooled. “I think we both know that’s not the case.”

Kairi laid down on her front, paws under her chin, and sighed. She was now face-to-face with Mickey. “Okay, you’re right. But… it’s not like there’s anything more anyone can do to help him.”

“What do you mean?” Mickey asked.

Kairi looked wary. “I’m not sure how much I can say… I’m worried, but I don’t want Sora getting upset with me.”

Mickey looked at her patiently. “Well, that’s okay. I think we already understand a fair amount already, though.” 

“You do?”

“Yes. I know you and Riku told us you left because the Islands didn’t feel the same, but from what Donald told me happened when they tried to speak with Sora’s mother, it sounded like Sora got kicked out of his house, which probably played a factor, am I right?”

Kairi stared at Mickey, eyes wide. “If you knew that, why didn’t you say so earlier?” she asked warily.

“Well, I figured you three must want it to stay secret for a reason. Or at least, Sora wants it to stay secret. I won’t ask for details why, but I do know that things like that can really take a lot out of someone emotionally, not just on the one directly affected but on those close to them too. If you ever need anyone to help, know I’ll support you however you need.”

Kairi smiled. “Thanks, Mickey.”

“Hey everyone!” Sora called, running back to the group. “Look who we found!” Not only Riku followed behind Sora, but also a huge red-maned definitely-adult lion. That must be Kiara’s father, Simba, Mickey figured. The mongoose instincts were telling him to run, but he held those back.

“You must be Simba!” Kairi said as she trotted over to the large lion. “Sora’s told us so much about you!”

“Let me guess, you’re Kairi?” Simba asked. “Sora’s told me much about you, as well!” He turned to the others. “Oh, and Donald and Goofy are here too, I see.” Simba chucked; Kiara was still chasing the two, unaware her father had returned. Simba turned to Mickey next. “And who are you? Another of Sora’s friends, I assume?”

“Yup! I’m Mickey!”

“Ah, the mysterious King that Donald and Goofy kept mentioning. Gotta say, I expected you to be… well, guess what Sora said is true: you really can’t control the world-changing magic too well.”

Mickey was surprised. “Sora told you about that?”

“Well, yeah, he was one of my summons when his world had fallen!” Sora said, hopping over. 

Simba chuckled. “Gotta say, it was a surprise when he showed up here in that form. Especially as a cub—I had no idea human ages were so different! Fourteen sun-cycles is well into adulthood for a lion.”

“Excuse me, but I’m sixteen now!” Sora said.

“Well, you slept for a year, so more like fifteen,” Riku teased.

“That’s still older than fourteen!”

“I agree with Riku,” Kairi giggled. “You’re fifteen.”

Sora stuck his tongue out; Kairi smacked it, and the two cubs began play-wrestling. After a few seconds of watching the two, Riku joined in, to Mickey’s amusement.

Simba sighed, looking at them fondly. “Ah, cubs. What’re you gonna do?” He looked towards the sun. “Hmm. Kiara and I probably should head back before dark; will you all be staying for dinner? I’m not too sure what mongeese eat, but I’m sure Timon and Puumba can whip something up.”

Mickey shook his head. “Thank you, but we need to be going. We actually came here to collect Riku and Sora. They, hmm, how do I put it…”

“Ran off without telling you?” Simba suggested, and Mickey nodded; it was close enough. “I figured as much. Overheard Riku trying to tell Sora yesterday that they had to tell someone where they went. Which I suppose didn’t happen if you’re here.”

Mickey shook his head. “Nope.” Well, at least he knew Riku had tried to be responsible.

Simba chuckled. “Yeah, I get it. Pretty sure Kiara’s going to be doing that too when she’s their age, especially if she takes after Nala and I…” he sighed. “It is what it is, I suppose. ‘Terrible Twos’, we call it, although I’m sure you have a different phrase for it.”

Mickey chuckled as well. “Something like that.”

“Hmmm. Well, I really need to get back to Pride Rock before dark…” Simba turned towards his cub. “Kiara! Time to go!”

“You too, Sora, Riku, Kairi!” Mickey called.

The three cubs stopped play-wrestling, ending up in a pile as they looked at Mickey. Kiara ran over to them, leaping on top. They made no move to actually get up.

Simba and Mickey convinced the cubs to untangle. Donald and Goofy joined them, and the groups started saying their goodbyes.

“Wait!” Kiara called, then looked at Sora. “I thought you were staying one more night,” she pouted, looking astoundingly like Sora did when he pouted.

“I did tell her that,” Sora said to the others, looking like he really did want to stay.

Thankfully Riku stepped in. “Sora, you know we can’t stay.” He turned to the smaller cub. “Kiara, I’m sorry, but our friends came to pick us up. We have to listen to them, for the same reasons you need to listen to your father.”

Kiara looked skeptical. “But they’re not lions.”

“It’s like Timon and Puumba,” Simba tried explaining. “They raised me, but they’re not lions either.”

“Ooooh,” Kiara said in realization. “So your dads died and you had to run away too?”

Riku cringed at that, and looked towards Sora and Kairi, who also looked unsure what to say. Mickey could understand why: explaining their situation to a kid would be… well, difficult, to say the least. 

“Kiara! That’s rude to ask,” Simba chided. 

“It’s okay,” Sora said. “Yes, mine did, long ago, but that’s not why we left. There was an accident, and we all got separated from our parents and ended up a very long way from home. Then the three adults here found us like Timon and Puumba found Simba.” It was an extremely simplified version, but better than trying to explain the world falling to darkness, Riku supposed.

Kiara’s eyes widened. “So you never saw your parents again?”

“Well, not quite,” Sora admitted, then shifted slightly, uncomfortable, but explained anyway. “We saw them briefly, but then I left again, this time willingly, and Riku and Kairi followed me.”

“Why would they follow you?” Kiara asked, ever curious. Thankfully she didn’t ask what those reasons were.

“Because we love him,” Riku supplied, and Kairi made a sound of agreement.

“Oh! Like daddy loves mommy?”

“Okay, Kiara, I think it’s time to go now,” Simba told his cub, before the conversation could get any more awkward. He nudged her with his paw to get her to stand up.

“Aww, do we have to?” Kiara complained.

“Oh! Wait!” Kairi suddenly said, pulling out her camera from who-knows-where. “My mom is gonna flip that we got to be lions; cats are her favorite animal!”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Hey you two!” Kairi said cheerfully, catching up to Sora and Riku on the way back to the ships. Sora had refused to be near Donald and Goofy, who still were trying to ask questions despite Mickey trying to tell them not to; so he bounded ahead of everyone—lions were much faster than the other animals—and Riku had stayed by Sora’s side as usual. “Quick question…”

“Hmm? What’s up, Kairi?” Riku asked.

“Well, Kiara kept calling you something interesting…”

“Interesting how?” Sora asked, while Riku blushed in realization, anticipating an awkward conversation. Sora and he hadn’t actually discussed that yet.

“Well, she used the word ‘mates’ quite a bit. Is there something you’re not telling…?” Kairi’s face expressed innocence, but she had a sly gleam in her eye.

“She picked up something her father said, that’s all,” Riku explained.

“So, her father called you mates?”

“Yeah, he used the term...” Riku replied apprehensively. This conversation had the potential to change everything.

“But you didn’t refute it?” Kairi was grinning now.

“Ah, well, a certain someone didn’t realize the context, and by the time he did, it was too late…”

“Hey!” Sora complained. “It’s not my fault! Anyone would make that mistake when half-asleep, stomach full of antelope, and on a super comfy bed!”

“That ‘bed’ was me.”

“Yes,” Sora agreed. “And you were quite comfortable.”

Kairi giggled. “And now the whole pride thinks you’re mates?”

Riku sighed. “Yup.”

Sora looked thoughtful, then grinned, chest puffed out in a show of pride. “You can be our mate too, Kairi!”

“Wh-what?” Kairi said, clearly in shock. If she were human, her face would probably be bright red.

“Yeah!” Sora continued. “All three of us will be mates. Lions aren’t monogamous. They wouldn’t question it!”

“I’m not sure lions questioning it is the issue here…” Riku muttered, equally as embarrassed as Kairi at Sora’s sudden proclamation. “You can’t just decide that for us.”

Sora deflated slightly. “So you don’t want to be?”

“What? I didn’t say that! Just, uh…”

“I’m okay with it,” Kairi said quickly, looking like she’d faint from embarrassment. “Um. Only if you two are, that is.”

Riku was speechless. Could they just do something like this? He admittedly had been noticing he had feelings for them both, and it was true half or more their conversations involved what could be interpreted as flirting in recent weeks… but he’d assumed some day they’d need to split into a couple and an extra; the idea that it could be all three had never occurred to him. Riku found himself getting excited at the idea.

“Riku?” Sora asked tepidly; he and Kairi were looking at him expectantly and nervously, and Riku realized he hadn’t answered.

“Yeah, I’m cool with that,” Riku said, heart giving a flutter as he grinned broadly at the two—or whatever the lion equivalent was.

“You guys!” Sora beamed, turning and managing to tackle them both to the ground, ending up with Riku and Kairi on their backs, Sora in the middle with a paw on each of them.

Kairi and Riku simultaneously rolled over so they now had a laughing Sora under them. Riku turned to Kairi and nuzzled her cheek, which she returned, before they both gave a lick behind Sora’s ears, eliciting a purr from the brown lion. If they were on a GummiShip now, Riku was certain they’d be able to travel the entire known universe on the power their current happiness produced.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Hey, Riku, mind if I talk to ya alone?” Mickey asked, pulling Riku aside once they’d arrived back in Radiant Garden. 

“Um. Sure.” Riku turned to look at Sora and Kairi. “I’ll catch up with you later,” he told them.

Sora stuck out his tongue. “Booooo. See if we leave you any food!”

Riku grinned. “Isn’t Tifa the one cooking tonight?” He laughed as Sora’s face scrunched up in disgust. Tifa was an excellent chef, but she typically preferred to use way too many green vegetables for Sora’s liking.

“Okay, fine, you can have the food,” Sora said with a slight pout, then grabbed Kairi’s hand as they headed towards Merlin’s with Donald and Goofy.

“So, what’s this about, Mickey?” Riku asked, once the group was sufficiently out of earshot. He had a feeling he already knew, though.

Mickey spoke somewhat tepidly. “Riku. Despite what Cid says, the Disney GummiShips almost never lose so much power that they crash, and in the few cases they have it was always with a single passenger. There were two of you. That means either neither of you could get happy, or one of you was so unhappy that it drained the power faster than the other could replenish it.”

Riku looked away in response.

“It’s Sora, isn’t it?”

Riku turned to look at the mouse, surprised. Normally people assumed Riku was the less happy one of the two. Had Sora really gotten so down that others had noticed, not just a select few? “Why would you think that?”

“Riku. We were looking for you. You didn’t think we’d check the Destiny Islands first?”

“Oh.” Frankly, Riku had forgotten that Mickey and them were here because the three had basically run away.

“I don’t know the extent of the situation, but when Donald and Goofy stopped by Sora’s, his mother said some pretty nasty things and informed them that he didn’t live there anymore. Whatever the reason, I know that sort of thing makes a huge impact on someone, and if the emotions aren’t handled correctly…”

“It begins to foster darkness,” Riku realized. “But I haven’t sensed any more than usual. His light is still strong.”

Mickey nodded. “That’s good to hear. Just, be careful, okay? And if you need any help—any of you, not just Sora—I’ll be here for ya, in whatever way you need. We all will be. Don’t feel like you have to get through this alone.”

Riku nodded. “Thank you, Mickey. Kairi and I seem to have Sora’s—well, I won’t mince words, it’s definitely depression—” Riku felt Mickey already knew and could keep confidentiality “—handled pretty well, as far as I can tell, but if we need further help, I’ll contact you.”

Mickey nodded, smiling gently, then looked slightly uncomfortable. “One more thing… The reason we were trying to contact you is that Yen Sid wants you and Sora to take an exam to be official Keyblade Masters, as well as to get Kairi training with her keyblade, although I understand you’ve been doing the latter with her already. Anyway. The exam would be slightly unorthodox, having to open keyholes to wake up sleeping worlds. It’ll be dangerous. It’s open for both of you to take if you want, but—”

Riku interrupted as he realized what Mickey was getting at. “No. We’re not ready yet. Especially Sora.” 

Mickey nodded. “I’m inclined to agree, all things considered. However, the decision is still ultimately up to you; just letting you know the option is there. Would you prefer to tell Sora, or would you like me to? He doesn’t need to be told right away.”

Riku thought for a moment. It would be easier to just let Mickey tell Sora, but… no, it needed to be Riku. He’d have to be careful about it. Sora tended to rush into things like this, and only Riku—or Kairi—would be able to convince him to wait. “I’ll tell him,” Riku decided. Possibly with Kairi’s help.

Mickey smiled. “I thought as much. Riku, I’m proud of you.”

Riku scrunched his eyebrows in slight confusion. “Proud of me? Why?”

“You’ve grown so much as a person over the past two years. You’re now someone people can look up to. You’re responsible, pragmatic, compassionate—you care so much for your friends, and take care of them so well. You’re a paragon of a keyblade wielder, and I’m sure you’ll make a brilliant Master someday.”

Riku was sure his face resembled a beet. “Thank you, Mickey… I really don’t know what to say…”

Mickey smiled. “You don’t need to say anything. I only say the truth. Now, let’s get back to Merlin’s before your boyfriend and girlfriend start to worry.” Mickey winked at Riku. Yes, his face was definitely resembling a beet by now. Mickey could be a little too intuitive sometimes!

“Right… oh! One more thing,” Riku remembered. “About Donald; apparently he’s said some things to Sora—”

“Yes, about his magical ability, I know,” Mickey interrupted, to Riku’s surprise. “We learned about the coliseum battles through Max and Phil. Donald made some comments, and this isn’t the first time his lack of faith in someone has affected their performance, so I figured that might have happened with Sora too. I already talked to him about it, but maybe you ought to tell me about your side of things, in case I missed something.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Riku! You’re back!” Sora yelled as soon as Riku entered the house. Riku barely had time to register what flew towards him before his face was full of a mess of brown hair as Sora literally jumped on him, legs around Riku’s waist and arms around his shoulders, hanging on like a monkey. Riku automatically caught his boyfriend—boyfriend!—around the waist, and Sora gave him a huge kiss, lasting a good five or so seconds and even nibbling his lip slightly. In front of everyone. “Donald’s being mean to me,” he then said.

Riku froze, taking a minute to process things. “Hi. Yeah, I’m back… um. Backtracking a second, you do realize literally everyone’s here, and neither of us are—were—actually out yet?” It was also technically their first kiss as humans.

Sora blushed. “Oh. Right. Um. Well I guess we are now?” He turned to the others. “Surprise?”

Kairi laughed, heading over to the two as Riku set Sora down. She gave Sora a slightly more chaste kiss that was more appropriate in public, and then leaned up to give Riku one too (again, first kiss with her as a human, for both of them). If anyone hadn’t been surprised, now they were—well, except Mickey, of course. Aerith, too, it seemed already knew, from her gentle smile.

Cid of all people was the first one to verbally react. “Well, can’t say it’s really unexpected.” Donald and Goofy looked somewhat more surprised, but did express agreement with Cid. 

Yuffie was next. “Kinda was wondering how you’d deal with that love triangle; gotta say, this is a perfect solution!”

“It was actually kinda painful to watch,” Tifa admitted with a smile. “Glad you figured things out.” Leon and Cloud nodded in agreement.

Aerith wasn’t looking at the three anymore, rather had an uncharacteristic savage smile as she looked at the others. “I believe that’s a hundred money from each of you. Pay up.”

“You bet on us?!” Riku gasped.

“I’ll tell the house to set up a shared bedroom for you,” Merlin said, eyes glittering. The three teens vigorously blushed, but chose not to reply. Should they take that offer? Honestly it wouldn’t actually be that different, considering Sora ended up in one of their beds every other night anyway. He was a little clingy after losing them in various ways over the past year and a half.

“Oh!” Riku remembered, turning to Sora. “You said Donald was being mean to you?”

“Oh, right.” Sora rubbed the back of his head and laughed awkwardly. “Uh, he was pressuring me again to say what happened with, uh, you know. Back at the Islands, why I was kicked out. And Goofy… well, he just seems confused about the whole situation. Something about how parents don’t stay angry at their kids or something? He can, uh, be a tad too optimistic…”

Mickey frowned. “Goofy, I explicitly told you to not say that.”

“But Mickey, what he said is impossible. Family doesn’t do that,” Goofy replied.

Sora glared at Goofy. “Well, according to my mom, I’m not her family anymore, so that point is mute.”

“‘Moot’”, Riku corrected.

“Yeah, that. Anyway, yeah. But considering what you just saw, I guess I can tell you why she did that now? Uh.” Sora shuffled nervously. “Um. Riku, you explain.”

Riku sighed. “Seriously, Sora?”

“I’m too nervous!” He grabbed Riku’s shirt and buried his face in his chest.

“But it’s—”

“Ugh, I’ll just do it,” Kairi jumped in. “Happy, Sora?”

Sora moved back slightly and grinned towards her. “Thanks, Kairi!”

Kairi rolled her eyes. “As you obviously know, especially considering the bets, we’re all bisexual.” Wait, all? Kairi included? That was news to Riku… actually, wait, no it wasn’t. There had been that thing with Peitho, after all. “Well, that kind of thing doesn’t go over well on the Islands. After Sora and Riku returned, rumors started—after all, they couldn’t tell people about their adventure because of the whole keeping-world-order thing, so all everyone knew was that two boys had run off together for over a year and a half. People like to speculate, some deciding that they must have secretly been together romantically. Sora’s mom confronted him about this. Sora, who had never thought about that much before considering most of puberty he was either fighting or asleep, didn’t say anything because he had no idea what she was going on about. By the time he caught on, she was on a rant about how it’s bad, and Sora argued with her about that, because he’d seen the world outside the Islands and knew most worlds aren’t so archaic. She took the arguing as a confession that he’s gay, even though in actuality Sora had no idea yet if he was or not, so she kicked him out.”

“But honestly after that it wouldn’t have mattered if she had or hadn’t,” Sora continued. Riku noticed tears were forming in his eyes. “I wouldn’t have been able to handle living there knowing she’s so bigoted. And even if she weren’t, the Islands just didn’t feel the same. We would have left eventually; this just expectiated the process.”

“‘Expediated,’” Riku corrected.

“Yeah, that.”

Everyone stayed quiet for a moment, contemplating. Riku knew some of them had suspected the reason already, but being directly told was a different matter.

Aerith walked over and hugged Sora. Tifa followed, and then one by one everyone else did, until they all had formed a huge group hug, Sora crying silently in the middle.

“Thank you,” Sora said through fading tears once they’d retreated. “Um. So, none of you are upset with that?” Sora confirmed.

Yuffie stared at him like he had three heads. “Of course not. We live with Merlin, for magic’s sake.”

Sora looked confused for a moment. “What’s that got to do with—oh!” Sora suddenly realized, and Riku chuckled. Merlin was...well. He currently was wearing a purple robe with rainbow stars, and today the house was lavender and also decorated with rainbow stars.

“You’ll always have a home here,” Leon told Sora resolutely. “All three of you.”

“Leon!” Sora’s eyes welled with new tears as he ran to the man, giving him a big hug. Leon wasn’t very comfortable with affection, as everyone knew, but the man accepted the hug regardless, putting a hand on Sora’s shoulder.

“Just don’t get my shirt wet,” the man mumbled, though his smile belied his faux annoyance.

Sora withdrew and beamed at Leon.

“One moment!” Donald squawked, finally finding his voice—and switched to an entirely different topic. “Merlin claims you know transformation magic, and the coliseum satyr said you used high-level spells he didn’t see before! Is that true?”

“Oh, yeah!” said Sora, suddenly excited. “Merlin’s been teaching me—he even helped me create some of my own spells! I can show you!” He began to gather energy, and a wind began swirling around him.

“No!” Kairi and Riku called, tackling Sora. Had he seriously been about to create a storm tornado in the house?

Merlin chuckled. “Remember, no weather magic in the house, Sora. Show him your cat transformation instead; he was in complete disbelief that you managed that one.”

Donald scoffed. “Almost no one can do that, there’s no way—” Donald cut himself off; Riku noticed Mickey giving him a Look.

Sora glared at Donald. “Really? Thanks for the confidence!” Within seconds, a brown-and-black tabby cat sat where Sora had been, still glaring at Donald. Somehow the fur on its head managed to be ruffled in a look reminiscent of Sora’s hair yet still appropriate for a cat.

Donald stood there in disbelief, sputtering, as though he wanted to say something in reaction but wasn’t sure what. Not only had Sora managed it, but he’d done so without saying the words aloud.

“See, Donald?” Goofy said. “All he needed was a different instructor!”

Donald crossed his arms. “Yeah, yeah,” he huffed, then smiled slightly and said to Sora, “Good job, I guess.” Well, it was better than expected from the duck, Riku figured. Maybe Mickey had gotten through to him.

Sora beamed at the rare show of praise from the duck, or at least did the best he could to do such, as he was still a cat—he couldn’t change back at the moment, as Kairi had practically thrown Sora into Riku’s arms so she could snap photos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Epilogue


	11. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mickey speaks to Yen Sid.   
> Riku tells Sora about the Mark of Mastery exam.  
> A certain someone is not too happy with how events have played out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a very short epilogue. :)

Mickey shifted nervously as Yen Sid stared at him in what could be interpreted as mild disbelief, although it was always difficult to tell with him. The mouse had bid farewell to the three teens and Radiant Garden crew shortly after the group discussion about Sora’s situation, heading immediately to Yen Sid’s Mysterious Tower, as the elderly wizard surely would be wondering why he was taking so incredibly long to collect the keyblade wielders. Mickey always was nervous when telling Yen Sid things he might not like; he knew it was illogical, as they technically were on equal standing now, but it was something that lingered from being the sorcerer’s apprentice so long ago.

“So,” Yen Sid said with metered words, seated behind the desk in his study. “You say that neither Sora nor Riku will be testing for the Mark of Mastery, and Kairi wants to train with them?” he summed up.

“Yup! That’s correct!” Mickey confirmed chipperly to hide his nervousness. “Kairi is actually doing quite well with her training. And Merlin has been teaching them better magic, too! You should see Sora’s—he even knows some transformation magic now!”

Yen Sid sat in silence for a moment. “Mickey, you must feel it too. Something dangerous is coming. The keyblade wielders must be ready.”

“And they will be, I’m sure of it. Again, you should see Sora’s magic!”

“Hmmm. Maybe, maybe not. Are you that positive they cannot be convinced?”

“Yes, Master. They have their own issues to deal with first.” Mickey gave up on telling Yen Sid about Sora’s magic—clearly he either didn’t believe him or didn’t care. No wonder Sora always doubted his skill, between the elderly wizard and Donald.

“Issues greater than the dark threats lurking on the horizon?”

Mickey sighed. Yen Sid could be tough to deal with when things didn’t go his way; he was always so stubborn. “Yes. If they head into new challenges before resolving their current ones, I’m afraid they will fail… no, worse than fail: they’ll be dragged into darkness.”

Yen Sid raised his eyebrows slightly. “Surely you exaggerate.”

Mickey shook his head. “No.”

“Riku I could see falling, as he’s done so before, but Sora is not likely to.”

“I must respectfully disagree. As it stands, Sora is the more likely one to fall—I cannot discuss why, but please, Master, trust me. You know how duplicitous darkness can be, feeding on emotions and insecurities; Xehanort is a master manipulator, who has used such before to weave darkness into people. They need time to resolve those issues first. When they are ready, they’ll take the exam, but for the time being, they need to work things out for themselves.”

Yen Sid closed his eyes, contemplating, before reaching his conclusion: “Very well. I will trust your judgement, Master Mickey.”

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

“Hey, Riku?” Sora asked, rolling over to stand—Sora had decided to change himself into a cat to lounge in the sun. They, along with Kairi, were near the entrance to the Radiant Garden castle, where the three were supposed to be working on planting some flowers. After all, restoration was as much aesthetic as it was construction. 

“Mhmm?” Riku replied, concentrating on creating a checkered pattern of blue and yellow begonias while Kairi tried to stop Rose—the red squirrel now followed the three everywhere when in Radiant Garden—from digging them up.

Sora strolled over to them and sat between Riku and Kairi. “What were you talking to Mickey about? A few days ago, after the Pride Lands incident.”

Riku stilled, pausing in his planting to think for a moment. He had planned to tell Sora sooner than later, but for the past few days had been mulling over exactly how to say things without causing too much upset. Well, guess he’d have to wing it. Kairi was there after all, and she was good at assuaging conflict between the boys on the rare occasions it happened. Might as well get it over with.

“Alakazam,” Sora said, and suddenly was human again. He shifted nervously, sitting back on his heels and looking at the flowers. “Was it about me?” he prodded.

Riku bit his lip slightly before replying. “Some of it.” Sora looked at Riku expectantly. Riku took a deep breath. “We discussed a couple of things,” he explained. “First—”

“The depression?” Sora answered.

Riku blinked. He didn’t realize Sora was aware, let alone accepting, enough of it to actually say it outright. 

“I saw that book the library gave you,” Sora explained with a sad smile, seeing Riku’s surprise. “At first I didn’t want to believe it, but then I thought about it a bit and… well, it does make sense.”

Riku nodded. “Yeah. We’re all worried,” he told Sora. “Mickey said that draining the power of a GummiShip with two people on it hasn’t happened before, and that things have to be really bad with one or both people for that to happen.”

Sora nodded. “Yeah. That made me realize just how bad it had gotten. I do feel a lot better since the Pride Lands, especially after we told them everything, but, well…” he trailed off.

Kairi completed the thought. “It won’t subside instantly. It might even keep lingering in the back of your mind forever. But remember, we’ll always be here to support you when you need it.”

“Always,” Riku confirmed.

Sora smiled. “Thanks, Kairi, Riku.” He pulled them both into a hug, accidentally crushing some of their freshly-planted flowers. “I love you two so much!”

“And we love you too, Sora,” Kairi said, kissing his cheek. Riku followed her example on Sora’s other cheek.

Sora beamed.

“Back to business though,” Riku said, steering them back on topic, although it had been a pleasant tangent. “Mickey said that harboring such intense negative emotion can make it easy for darkness to get in. I know you can’t help the emotion, but please, let me know if you feel any hint of darkness. I can help you with it.”

Sora nodded his head. “Got it. Thanks, Riku.”

“Of course.”

Sora frowned. “You know, I never learned why they actually were looking for us. Did Mickey tell you?”

Riku nodded. “Yes. I’ve been trying to figure out how exactly to bring it up. Yen Sid wants us to take some sort of exam to earn the official title of Keyblade Master.”

Sora frowned. “There’s an official title? We aren’t already?”

“Apparently not. We’re keyblade wielders. We need to take a test called the ‘Mark of Mastery’ to get the official title. Mickey says it’ll be tough though, and dangerous, and—”

“You don’t think I’m ready.”

Riku blinked. Sora was catching on quickly today, and without any hint of upset. “No. I don’t think we’re ready. Plural. So much has happened the past couple months that have changed everything. Neither of us are in the right mindset… also, I didn’t tell Mickey, but I just have a bad feeling about it, like if we’re not fully prepared something bad will happen. Like something is lying in wait. Mickey said it’ll be different than usual tests, something about opening keyholes in sleeping worlds? I dunno exactly. But he seems just as concerned about emotions being problematic—”

“I agree.”

“Huh?” Riku had been prepared for a much bigger argument; things were going unexpectedly smoothly, knock on wood.

“I agree,” Sora repeated. “It’s not a good idea to do something like that right now. And I trust your gut. If you’re getting a bad feeling, I think we should listen to it.”

Riku stared at Sora, still not processing.

Sora grinned in return. “Surprised I’m being so responsible?”

Riku blushed. “Um…”

Sora laughed. “No, I get it. If it were when we first got back to the Islands, I’d probably rush right into it. But these past months… they’ve really changed me. Made me think about stuff. Maybe… maybe it was a good thing all this happened, in the end.”

“You think?”

“Yeah… oh! Hey, Kairi!” Sora turned to the girl. “What do you think about taking the test with us? When you’re trained of course!”

Kairi looked at Sora, excitement slowly streaking across her face. “Really? It might take a while, though…”

Sora shook his head. “That’s okay! Take as long as you need; we’ll wait for you!”

Riku nodded. “Yes. However long it takes. Then we’ll all be Keyblade Masters—together.”

“Just like it should be!” Sora added. “All three of us, together forever!”

Kairi’s smile alone could have lit up the entire Realm of Darkness.

◄◄◄♥☻♥☻♥☻♥►►►

Meanwhile, in a sleeping version of Traverse Town, a teenage tan-skinned white-haired boy waited. “Where in the worlds are they?” He wondered aloud as he violently paced back-and-forth. “Ugh. The bastard said it'd be a day or two, not weeks! This is so bo-ring.” He halted his pacing, opened his arms, and glared up at the sky. “Where are you?” he yelled. Then the boy dropped his arms and slumped his shoulders, speaking in a more normal volume as he grumbled, “I could be playing games with Eraqus right now. But noooo, old me had to have some convoluted time-travel super-sleep plot.” He stomped his foot. “This is so fucking stupid!”

After a few more minutes of angry pacing, the boy stopped again. He narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms, a look of determination forming on his face. “You know what? I’m going to get out of here, find that bastard, and beat him to a pulp. Don’t care if he’s actually me or whatever. Then I’m gonna go about doing things my way. There’s gotta be easier methods than this stupid thing. And less boring ones.” The boy shook his head and let out an indignant laugh. “He seriously just wants me to talk to the kid? No, you know what, that alone is stupid. I’m outta here.” He waved his hand, opened a dark portal, and stepped through.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Angsty Young Xehanort is fun to write.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! 
> 
> Sequel is in the works. It'll start being posted sometime in November 2020. It'll be from the POVs of Riku and Vanitas!


End file.
